Prop trading from Austria: FMA, firms and tax

In the classic sense, prop trading means a company trades financial instruments on its own account and at its own risk, not for clients. Per the FMA, new forms are increasingly appearing: online "trading challenges", training programmes or profit-sharing schemes for external traders. The companies often benefit from many traders generating trading data, the FMA writes^[1].

Per the FMA, most prop trading platforms are currently not subject to any official supervision. They therefore do not have to meet the strict requirements that apply to regulated financial service providers^[1]. Who the counterparty is on a simulated account, and where the firms' money comes from, is covered in "Funded" explained.

The FMA does not only address providers. One section asks explicitly what external traders need to be aware of under supervisory law, and the page concludes that providers and participants alike should carefully weigh both the economic risks and the classification under supervisory law^[1].

Depending on how the business model is designed, the FMA names these investment services requiring a licence under the Securities Supervision Act 2018 (WAG 2018) in particular: investment advice, individual portfolio management and proprietary trading^[1][2].

Where only fictitious capital is traded, the main question per the FMA is whether this is investment advice requiring a licence, meaning a personal recommendation to a client on transactions in financial instruments. Prop trading is not a classic case, the FMA writes, but can be one: an external trader who puts a notional representation of a financial instrument, such as a derivative, into a notional portfolio in a simulated environment may in substance be making a recommendation to buy or sell. That the notional instrument has no direct monetary value is not decisive^[1].

Investment advice requires a licence when it is carried out with the intention of generating income and relates to financial instruments. Whether that is actually the case depends on the specific circumstances of the business model; the key factors per the FMA are^[1]:

• whether trading takes place exclusively in a simulated environment,
• whether the trading decisions relate to financial instruments,
• whether those decisions are used commercially,
• whether a personal recommendation is made,
• whether the activity is carried out with the intention of generating income.

Profit sharing, covering of losses or repayment commitments may also matter for other licence requirements, the FMA adds, so a blanket assessment is not possible^[1].

What does that mean for you? The FMA gives criteria, not a result for individual firms or participants, and PropCrab cannot give one either. For a specific question, the FMA answers consumer enquiries within its remit; you can ask in writing or by phone, describing the specific background. For legal representation it points to the bar association (Rechtsanwaltskammer)^[3].

• Pay first: traders often pay first, for example for training, a verification phase or challenges. The FMA advises carefully checking the chances, risks, possible benefit and your own legal protection, for example as a consumer^[1].
• Gamblers and gaming house: paid challenges can create a situation similar to the relationship between gamblers and a gaming house, as the FMA's English page puts it. The company alone sets the rules, and they are not necessarily balanced. The decisive question is whether traders pay more in fees than they can realistically get back^[1][2].
• Unclear offers: the enquiries the FMA receives show an increased risk that participants do not fully grasp the economic and legal consequences. The same platform's offer is often understood in very different ways, for example because of a misleading presentation, a lack of transparency on whether real trading takes place or only a simulation, or complex contract terms^[1].
• Spreads: traders who made losses report heavily inflated spreads compared with real brokers, the FMA writes. Its example: market spread 0.8 pips, the prop firm's spread 2.5 pips^[1].
• Discounts and pressure: many platforms advertise discounts, sometimes of up to 90%, and rely on pressure to perform and gamification. That motivates traders to pay challenge fees again and again. The business model often lives mainly on those fees, not on realistic trading^[1].

Work out what several attempts cost together with the cost of repeat attempts.

PropCrab's profiles record the firms' statements on Austrian residence, with their own pages as the source; where one is missing, the reason is given. Mostly, "allowed" means Austria is not on the list of restricted countries. At The5ers and FundingPips that list is not worded as exhaustive^[26][20]. For Tradeify, PropCrab did not find the list of countries without access to Elite Live^[28].

"Allowed" does not mean at every stage and for good. The statements reflect each profile's date; whether citizenship counts too and when identity verification happens is covered in the checklist before you buy. Check the firm's country list yourself on the day you buy. Filtered: firm list for Austrian residents.

The FMA publishes its warnings on a searchable page; on 3 November 2026 it showed 1,281 entries^[4]. A 2025 warning, for example, names the provider and its website and states that it is not authorised to provide securities services requiring a licence in Austria; the publication is based on § 92 (11) WAG 2018^[5]. Whether a company holds an FMA licence, and to what extent, is shown in the company database^[6].

On 3 November 2026 PropCrab searched the FMA warnings for the brand names of every firm in the table above and for "prop trading" and "funded": no match^[4]. That is a snapshot of the brands, not of every company behind them; before you buy, also search the names in the terms and the imprint.

A shared word is not a match. Search for "Apex" and you find, among others, a 2006 warning about the "Apex Trading Group", with the website apex-tg.com and alleged offices in Singapore, Tokyo and Taipei^[7], and a 2025 warning about "FintrexTrader 6.2 Apex" with a .ru website^[5]. The futures firm in PropCrab's profiles, by contrast, names as its operator Apex Trader Funding Inc. in Austin, Texas (USA)^[29]. So compare company name, website and registered seat, not just the brand.

And no entry does not mean "supervised": whether a firm holds an FMA licence is shown in the company database^[6], and per the FMA most prop trading platforms are not subject to any official supervision^[1].

For a complaint, the first step per the FMA should always be a complaint to the company itself. The FMA accepts complaints about supervised companies once you have gone through the company's complaints process. It cannot obtain an individual solution for you; its duty is collective consumer protection, and individual cases are left to ombudsman schemes, arbitration and conciliation bodies and the courts^[3].

Other bodies on the FMA page include the conciliation body for consumer transactions (Schlichtung für Verbrauchergeschäfte), the consumer association VKI, the Chamber of Labour (Arbeiterkammer) and, if you suspect a criminal offence, the public prosecutor and the police^[3]. The page does not say whether any of them is responsible for a dispute with a prop firm abroad. Chargebacks and evidence when a firm closes: when a prop firm closes.

Not tax advice. The points below come from BMF pages. None mentions prop trading, challenges or payouts from a simulated account, and PropCrab found no BMF page on it.

• Who is liable: anyone with a residence or habitual abode in Austria has unlimited income tax liability, in principle on all domestic and foreign income ("worldwide income"). Double taxation treaties exist so that nobody pays twice on the same income^[8].
• Seven types of income: the BMF lists agriculture and forestry, self-employment, business operations (Gewerbebetrieb), employment, capital assets, letting and leasing, and other income. Income here is a balance: receipts minus expenses^[8].
• Business operations: per the BMF, this covers all other independent, sustained activities that go beyond merely managing your own assets^[8].
• Capital assets: these include gains from shares, derivatives and cryptocurrencies, among others. The special tax rate is 27.5%, or 25% for income from deposits with credit institutions, such as interest on savings books^[8].
• Other income: this includes speculative transactions and income from occasional services, such as one-off brokerage commissions, among others^[8].
• Tax return: if the tax office asks you to, you must file one. Without a request, the BMF lists these cases for 2025, among others: no income subject to wage tax and an income above EUR 13,308; or, next to income subject to wage tax, other income of more than EUR 730 in total with an overall income above EUR 14,517^[9].
• Cryptocurrencies: stablecoins such as Tether can fall under the BMF's definition of cryptocurrency. Income from cryptocurrencies, for example gains when selling them for euros, belongs in principle to capital assets at 27.5%. If the activity goes beyond merely managing your own assets, it is business income per the BMF^[10].

The FMA compares paid challenges to the relationship between gamblers and a gaming house^[2]. That describes the economic relationship. The FMA page says nothing about tax, and PropCrab draws no tax classification from it.

Keep invoices for challenges, payout statements and bank statements, and settle the open questions with a tax adviser before you file your return.