PickMyTrade + Apex Trader Funding Setup Guide

PickMyTrade accepts a TradingView webhook and places the order in Tradovate, and it can route one Pine Script signal to several Apex evaluations at once. Here's the complete setup.

PickMyTrade vs. TradersPost for Apex

The two services solve the same problem with different trade-offs:

Features and pricing on both services change, so check each one's current terms directly. For the TradersPost setup, see our TradersPost setup guide. If your accounts are on NinjaTrader 8 or Tradovate, there's also the route Target Filled recommends, covered in Automating Apex with CrossTrade below.

Step 1 — connect Tradovate to PickMyTrade

Start at PickMyTrade's website and create an account. Once logged in:

1. Go to Brokers in the sidebar and select Add Broker.
2. Choose Tradovate — PickMyTrade supports both its live and demo environments.
3. Authorize through Tradovate's OAuth flow using the same credentials used to log into the Tradovate platform directly.
4. Select the specific Apex evaluation account from the list PickMyTrade shows after authorizing. Multiple eval accounts can all be added here for later routing.

Step 2 — set up the trading bot

PickMyTrade organizes automations as "bots" — each one maps a TradingView signal source to one or more broker accounts.

1. Go to Bots → Create Bot and name it descriptively (e.g. "MES EMA Crossover — Apex Eval").
2. Under Symbol, enter the Tradovate contract identifier — MES for Micro E-mini S&P 500, MNQ for Micro E-mini Nasdaq. PickMyTrade resolves the front-month contract automatically.
3. Set Quantity to the contracts per signal — most traders start with 1 MES or MNQ on a $50K Apex eval.
4. Under Order Type, select Market for simplicity during testing.
5. Under Linked Accounts, select the Apex evaluation account connected in Step 1.
6. Save the bot — PickMyTrade generates a webhook URL for it. Copy it.

Step 3 — wire the webhook into TradingView

1. Add the Pine Script to the chart and open Add Alert.
2. Set Condition to the strategy or alertcondition name.
3. Under Notifications, enable Webhook URL and paste the bot's webhook URL.
4. In Message, paste PickMyTrade's expected JSON payload:

{
  "passphrase": "your-bot-passphrase",
  "ticker": "{{ticker}}",
  "action": "{{strategy.order.action}}",
  "quantity": {{strategy.position_size}}
}

The passphrase is set inside the bot's settings and acts as a security key against unauthorized signals — set it to a random string and keep it private. For scripts using alertcondition() rather than strategy.entry(), create two separate alerts — one for long entries with an action of "buy", one for short entries with "sell" — both pointed at the same webhook URL.

Testing before going live

Don't skip this. A single misconfigured alert on a live evaluation account can hit the drawdown floor before the problem is even noticed.

1. Switch the bot's linked account to Tradovate's demo account rather than the live evaluation.
2. Fire the TradingView alert manually using the Alerts panel's test feature, or wait for a real signal on a test chart.
3. Check the PickMyTrade bot log to confirm the webhook was received and an order was sent.
4. Check Tradovate's order history to confirm the fill appeared at the expected price and quantity.
5. Run at least 5–10 complete entry/exit pairs in paper mode across different sessions before switching to the live evaluation account.

Prop firm compliance — what to check

Automation doesn't exempt a script from Apex's rules — it enforces the strategy's behavior around the clock, which means any rule violation baked into the Pine Script happens automatically too. Confirm the script has all of the following before going live:

• Session filter set to RTH. Most prop firms, Apex included, expect flat overnight positions on evaluation accounts. A session filter that closes and blocks new entries outside the intended window handles this automatically.
• EOD flatten. A hard close of all positions at a fixed time before the close, as a backstop in case the session filter fires but a position is already open.
• An internal risk cap. Apex publishes no official daily loss limit at any account size, so there's no firm-mandated figure to size a kill switch against. A script still needs a self-imposed ceiling sized against the account's trailing drawdown (roughly 20–25% of it is a reasonable default), since nothing else stops a losing streak from running unchecked.
• Bar-close entries. Setting calc_on_every_tick = false in the strategy declaration prevents intrabar noise from triggering orders and keeps backtested results aligned with what live trading actually produces.
• No news-time entries. Major releases (CPI, NFP, FOMC) can cause extreme slippage. A news filter or manual pause around those windows is good practice even without a specific firm rule requiring it.

Free Pine Script snippets covering each of these — session filter, EOD flatten, a risk cap, bar-close entries — are at /snippets.

Running on multiple Apex accounts

Once one Apex evaluation is passed and scaling across several accounts is the goal, PickMyTrade's multi-account routing makes the setup straightforward:

1. Add each additional Apex evaluation account under Brokers using the same Tradovate OAuth flow — each gets its own entry in the broker list.
2. In the bot's Linked Accounts settings, check every account the same signal should reach.
3. Set quantity per account independently — a $50K eval might run 1 MES while a $100K eval runs 2, from the same bot and the same TradingView alert.

For a full walkthrough of running several evaluations at once, including how to stagger them and manage correlated drawdown, see the multi-account prop firm guide.

Automating Apex with CrossTrade

If your Apex accounts are on NinjaTrader 8 or Tradovate, CrossTrade is the automation platform Target Filled recommends. It takes a TradingView webhook alert, in its own message format, and places the order on your account:

• Tradovate: link the account to CrossTrade in the browser. There's nothing to install. CrossTrade for Tradovate
• NinjaTrader 8: CrossTrade connects through a desktop add-on. CrossTrade for NinjaTrader
• Several accounts: one alert can place on multiple accounts, and CrossTrade's trade copier can copy a trade from one account to others.
• Account Manager: set a max daily loss, a max daily profit, and a trailing drawdown on each account, plus a scheduled end-of-day flatten. When a limit is hit, it flattens the positions and locks the account. Because Apex publishes no daily loss limit, this is one place to hold the internal risk cap from the checklist above. On NinjaTrader, the limits and auto-flatten only run while NinjaTrader and the CrossTrade add-on are running.

The TradingView to Tradovate guide walks through the alert message and setup step by step, and every Target Filled Pro strategy has the CrossTrade alert message built in. Apex's automation rules differ between the evaluation and a live Performance Account, so check the current rules before connecting any funded account. The account limits are controls you set, not a guarantee.

CrossTrade offers a 7-day free trial, no credit card required. Target Filled is built by the team behind CrossTrade, the automation platform we recommend.