Setting up MetaTrader 5 for a funded account takes about twenty minutes, and most of it is making sure the terminal cannot do something the rules punish. Log in with the credentials the firm issues, switch on one-click trading only if you also attach a stop to every order, learn the lot cap before you hit it, and read the commission and swap on each symbol's specification before you trade it.
The platform is the same MT5 you would download from the vendor for any broker. What differs on a funded account is that a loss limit sits behind every trade, and the terminal does not know about it. The dashboard does. This article is about setting up the two so they agree.
CFD accounts at WhitePips run on MT5 across desktop, web and mobile. The CFD plan pages carry each plan's limits, and the trading rules hold the wording; the figures below are from them.
Logging in: account, password and server
Platform credentials are issued after identity verification, in the dashboard. You get three things: a login number, a password and a server name. In MT5, open File, then Login to Trade Account, type the server name exactly as given in the search box and pick it from the list, then enter the login and password. If the server does not appear, the name is mistyped or the terminal is an old build; update it before trying again.
Check the bottom-right corner of the terminal. A connection speed in kilobytes means you are in; "Invalid account" means the login or server is wrong; "No connection" means the server is unreachable, a network problem rather than a credential one. Once in, confirm in the Navigator panel that it is the account you meant to trade; a trader with an evaluation and a funded account open at once has placed a trade on the wrong one more than once.
Do not share the password. Verification before credentials is how the firm knows the person trading is the person it will pay.
One-click trading, and the condition for using it
One-click trading is under Tools, Options, Trade, with a box to tick and a disclaimer to accept. With it on, the panel in the top-left corner of the chart buys or sells at market the instant you click, with no confirmation. With it off, every order opens the order window first.
The speed is real and so is the cost. One-click orders are placed without a stop loss unless you add one afterwards, and a market order with no stop on a funded account is a position whose only limit is the plan's. On a $10K Edge 1 Step the Daily Loss Limit is $400, and a position opened without a stop at 1 lot of EURUSD reaches it in 40 pips.
The workable rule is this: one-click trading on, and a stop attached to every position before you look away from it. Drag the position line on the chart to the stop level, or modify the position in the Toolbox. Keep one-click off until that movement is a habit.
A stop loss on every order, sized to the daily limit
The daily limit on a CFD plan is hard: reaching it ends the account, so every stop has to sit well inside it. The Maximum Loss Limit is hard: reaching it closes the account. Both are measured on the account, not on the trade, so the stop on each trade needs to be chosen from the limit, not from the chart alone.
Work it out once. Take the Daily Loss Limit in dollars, decide how many losing trades you are prepared to take in a day before stopping, and divide. On a $25K Edge 2 Step the Daily Loss Limit is $1,125; three losses before you stop means $375 a trade, which at 1 lot of EURUSD is a stop of about 37 pips, or a wider stop at a smaller size. The post on sizing against the limit does the full arithmetic, and the daily loss limit and the hour it resets explains when the day rolls.
MT5 will not stop you trading past the limit; the firm's system will. The stop is your version of the rule, placed before the rule has to be.
The lot cap: Max lots and what the error means
The maximum lots per trade on a CFD account are capped by the platform. The cap is in the symbol's specification under Volume max, and the account's leverage, which is printed on your plan, also limits what the margin can carry. An order above the cap is rejected with "Invalid volume"; an order the margin cannot cover is rejected with "Not enough money". Neither is a breach. Both are the platform saying no before the rules have to.
Two rules work alongside the cap. Max. Exposure limits the total notional open on the account; a breach is a warning, and if the account is in profit the profit is reset to the starting balance, with a second breach closing the account. On Instant Pro and Instant Go, Max Floating Loss per Symbol limits how far one symbol's open positions may float below 1.5% of the starting balance: 1% sends a notice, the first breach at 1.5% is a formal warning. The dashboard's rule cards show all of these live; MT5 shows none of them.
Reading commission and swap on a symbol's specification
Right-click any symbol in Market Watch and choose Specification. It is the most useful screen in the terminal for a funded trader, and most never open it.
- Contract size and tick value tell you what one lot is worth per point.
- Volume min, max and step tell you the smallest, largest and finest order sizes the platform accepts.
- Swap long and swap short are the overnight charges, with the day on which a triple swap is applied.
- Trading hours tell you when the symbol closes, which is not the same as when your day ends.
Commission is not in the specification window; it appears in the Commission column of the Trade tab once a position is open. At WhitePips it is charged half on the open and half on the close. Per lot, round turn, Edge and Instant pay $5 on forex, $6 on metals, $6 on energies, nothing on indices and stocks, and 0.06% of the trade value on crypto; Prime pays $4, $5, $6, free and 0.045%. A 1-lot EURUSD trade on an Edge account shows $2.50 of commission when it opens and $2.50 more when it closes. Commission counts toward your loss limits like any other cost.
Swap is charged on positions held past 5 PM New York time, at the symbol's normal rate, and triple on Wednesday. The Swap-Free add-on removes it for a fixed price per size: $9 on $2.5K, $21 on $5K, $45 on $10K, $47 on $25K, $95 on $50K, $121 on $100K, $146 on $200K. Swap-free is separate from Weekend Holding: without that add-on, open CFD positions are closed by the system on Friday at 4:45 PM New York time, the first time as a warning and the second closing the account. Both add-ons are chosen when you buy.
The specification window tells you what a trade costs before you take it. The Trade tab tells you afterwards. Funded traders read the first one.
MT5 mobile and the web terminal
The MT5 app for iOS and Android logs in with the same server, login and password. It is good for watching positions, moving stops and closing trades, and a poor place to open them, because the lot field is easy to mis-tap. Turn on push notifications so that a stop being hit reaches your phone.
The dashboard at app.whitepips.com also has a web terminal, which trades the same account from a browser. It sits next to the rule cards, the warnings ledger and the countdown to the daily reset, so the limit and the position are on one screen. Whatever you trade from, it is one account: a stop moved on the phone is moved everywhere.
Common mistakes
- Trading the wrong account. Two logins in one terminal look identical; check the Navigator before the first order of the day.
- One-click trading with no stop. The most expensive setting in the terminal.
- Forgetting the Friday close. A position still open at 4:45 PM New York on Friday without the Weekend Holding add-on is closed by the system, and the first time counts as a warning.
- Reading the swap on Thursday. The triple swap is applied on Wednesday; a position held through Wednesday night pays three days.
- Expecting MT5 to enforce the rules. It enforces the lot cap and the margin. The daily limit, the Maximum Loss Limit, exposure and floating loss are enforced by the firm's system, and only the dashboard shows them.
- Thirty days without a closed trade. An inactive CFD account is ended after 30 days without a trade, and a terminal that is logged in does not count as activity.
- Running an EA you did not write. Expert advisors are allowed if they are yours; the AutoTrading button does not check ownership, and the risk desk does.
Questions traders ask
Can I use my existing MT5 install and templates? Yes. Add the firm's server and log in as a second account; charts, indicators, templates and your own EAs carry over unchanged.
Where do I see the daily limit in MT5? You do not. MT5 shows balance, equity and margin. The Daily Loss Limit, Maximum Loss Limit and exposure are on the rule cards in the dashboard, with the time left until the daily reset.
Why was my order rejected with Invalid volume? The size is above the symbol's Volume max or not a multiple of its Volume step. Open the specification, read both figures, and resize. A rejected order is not a rule breach.