Independent PineHook setup guide. PineHook is not affiliated with or endorsed by AquaFunded.
How to Connect TradingView to AquaFunded (MT5, 2026)
Yes, you can run TradingView alerts on an AquaFunded account, and this guide covers exactly how. TradingView cannot place a trade at a prop firm directly, and it does not need to. An AquaFunded account comes with a trading platform, so connecting the two means carrying your alerts across to that platform and executing them there. AquaFunded offers MetaTrader 5 alongside MatchTrader, TradeLocker and cTrader. Their help centre answers the automation question in one sentence: "Yes, EAs are allowed, provided they are used as part of your own personal trading strategy".
The setup is the easy half. The part that takes attention is that AquaFunded's drawdown shape changes between models that sound almost identical: the 1 Step trails your peak while the 2 Step Standard never moves, and the Pro variants differ again. Their daily limit resets at midnight UTC, which is the simplest reset of any firm we have written up, and their copy-trading permission is wider than most, reaching accounts you hold away from the firm. This guide covers the setup and then each of those, with links to AquaFunded's own help centre so you can check everything yourself.
Every firm fact below was checked paragraph by paragraph against AquaFunded's own help centre on 2026-08-31. Specifications change; the linked sources are authoritative.
The quick facts#
| Question | Answer | Source |
|---|---|---|
| MT5 available? | Yes, alongside MatchTrader, TradeLocker and cTrader | Platforms |
| EAs allowed? | Yes, as part of your own personal strategy | Are EAs and trade copiers allowed? |
| Copy trading? | Yes, including between an AquaFunded account and your own external accounts | Is copy trading allowed? |
| Daily reset | 00:00 UTC, on the higher of balance or equity | 1 Step Standard |
| Weekend holding? | Allowed, no overnight or weekend restriction | See "News and weekends" below |
| Works with PineHook? | Yes, on the MT5 accounts | This guide |
How PineHook fits in#
PineHook is an automation software service that connects TradingView to MetaTrader 5. When a TradingView alert fires, its webhook reaches our relay, which checks it and hands it to the PineHook EA attached to a chart in your MT5 terminal. The EA executes the order and reports back to your Signal Logs, and it handles the trade management side too: stops, targets and partial closes. Our status page publishes the current MT5 relay median, measured from webhook receipt to the EA queue, separately from cTrader processing.
Two properties matter on a funded account. First, the EA runs on your machine, so AquaFunded's servers see trades from your terminal, exactly as if you had clicked them. Second, PineHook never asks for your MT5 login or your AquaFunded dashboard credentials. Your account stays yours.
Setting it up#
AquaFunded issues your MT5 login, password and server name with your credentials after purchase. Prop firms assign a numbered server per account rather than publishing one name, so use the string from that email; one copied from a forum belongs to a different feed and will refuse your login.
From there the PineHook side takes a few minutes:
- Log into the MT5 terminal with your AquaFunded credentials.
- Create a PineHook account, free during the beta, then install the PineHook EA and attach it to any chart, following the installation guide. Enable algorithmic trading in the terminal.
- Create a license on the Licenses page of your dashboard and paste its key into the EA input.
- In TradingView, create an alert whose webhook points at PineHook, and put your license key in the message using any of the command formats.
- Send a test alert and confirm it lands in your Signal Logs and your terminal.
Symbols and sizing#
Your alert carries the ticker from the TradingView chart it fired on, and your terminal has to recognise that name. The two often differ, because a TradingView ticker belongs to whichever data provider is on your chart, while your terminal shows the names on AquaFunded's own feed. Prop-firm feeds also commonly append a suffix marking the simulated environment. So open Market Watch once, before your first live alert, and read the exact spellings your account uses.
Where they differ, symbol mapping reconciles them and your Pine Script never changes. Two controls cover every case. The prefix and suffix boxes take a whole feed that carries one affix, so you enter it once and a chart firing EURUSD reaches an account listing EURUSD.x without a single rename. The table below them handles names that differ outright rather than by an affix, usually the indices, where you put the TradingView ticker on the left and your terminal's spelling on the right.
Each license carries its own map, so an account elsewhere with different names keeps its own list and one alert still serves both.
Sizes are read from the terminal too. Minimum lot and lot step sit in each symbol's specification window and set the smallest volume an alert can ask for. At the other end, AquaFunded state they have "no maximum lot size limit" and do not monitor or restrict position size, which is unusual in this category.
On cost, all accounts run ECN spreads with commission of 5 dollars per lot on FX and commodities, and nothing on indices and crypto. Sizing by percentage or cash risked rather than a fixed lot figure is the safer habit on any account with a daily loss limit, because it lets the EA work the volume out from your stop distance on the account it is trading.
One more thing before you automate: AquaFunded allow hedging within the same trading account, permit martingale, and do not require a stop loss. Opposite positions on one instrument inside one account are fine, which is not true at every firm. Their page does not address hedging across two accounts, so treat that as unanswered rather than allowed.
AquaFunded's rules, and how to automate inside them#
Two limits, and both reset at midnight UTC#
The numbers differ by model. Per AquaFunded's own model pages:
| Model | Daily loss | Max drawdown | Shape |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Step Standard | 3% | 6% | Trailing on balance or equity |
| 1 Step Pro | 3% | 6% | Trailing on balance or equity, locks at 6% profit |
| 2 Step Standard | 5% | 8% | Static |
| 2 Step Pro | 5% | 10% | Trailing on balance or equity |
| 3 Step | 4% | 8% | Static |
| Instant Funding Standard | not stated | 3% | Trailing on balance |
| Instant Funding Pro | 3% | 6% | Trailing on equity |
Both limits are percentages of your initial account balance. The daily figure re-anchors at 00:00 UTC on the higher of your balance or equity at that moment, which is the friendliest reset we have come across: no timezone arithmetic, and it lines up with the clock PineHook already uses everywhere else. PineHook runs the two as separate guards, checked once a second on your own terminal with floating profit and loss included, so whichever you reach first blocks new entries, closes everything, or both. To work in cash rather than percentages, flip Limit Unit to $.
The two Instant models carry a rule the evaluations do not: a floating-loss cap that closes the account permanently if unrealised loss reaches -2% of the starting balance, before either limit above is touched. They also apply a consistency rule at payout, where no single day may account for 20% of profits on the Standard or 15% on the Pro. Neither is something an alert-driven strategy trips by accident, but both are worth knowing before you point one at an Instant account.
One combination to avoid: leaving the overall mode on End of Day measures the day, which is the daily limit again, so PineHook will not run both that way. Pick the mode matching your model's drawdown shape, which is the next section and the most important setting on this page.
Matching the drawdown shape to your model#
Two models can carry the same 6% and behave nothing alike, so read your own model's page.
On the 2 Step Standard and the 3 Step, the maximum drawdown is static, measured from your starting balance and never moving. A 100,000 account on the 2 Step Standard breaches at 92,000 whether that happens in week one or after you have grown it to 130,000. Set Measured from to Static and put your starting balance in the equity baseline.
The 1 Step models are the interesting ones. AquaFunded's maximum drawdown there is "6% of your highest recorded balance/equity during the evaluation". Balance or equity, whichever is higher, which means an open position sitting in profit lifts your floor while it is still open. That is the opposite of a firm like Blue Guardian, whose floor follows closed trades only, and it is why the correct setting differs between two firms whose published percentage is identical. Set Measured from to Trailing (floating), which tracks the peak of balance and equity together and is AquaFunded's rule exactly.
The Instant Funding Standard is the one exception, and it is easy to miss because it looks like the others. Its floor follows your highest recorded account balance, balance only, where the Instant Funding Pro uses "highest recorded equity, including both closed and floating PnL". Balance only is the closed-trade shape, so the Standard wants Trailing (closed) while every other trailing model here wants floating. Two accounts at one firm, same word on the page, opposite setting.
The Pro variant adds a lock: on the 1 Step Pro, once you hit the 6% profit target your "trailing drawdown locks at the starting balance and it will no longer trail further". Lock Floor At Profit reproduces that freeze, so set it to 6 on the Pro and leave it at 0 on the Standard, whose page documents no such lock and whose floor keeps climbing behind you. That field and Measured from describe the shape of the firm's floor rather than a threshold, so both should match the firm exactly. The two percentages are limits, and matching those is the mistake the next paragraph is about.
| Model | Measured from | Lock Floor At Profit |
|---|---|---|
| 1 Step Standard | Trailing (floating) | 0 |
| 1 Step Pro | Trailing (floating) | 6 |
| 2 Step Standard, 3 Step | Static | leave at 0 |
| 2 Step Pro | Trailing (floating) | 0 |
| Instant Funding Standard | Trailing (closed) | 0 |
| Instant Funding Pro | Trailing (floating) | 0 |
Both guards armed on one license, showing AquaFunded's own published 1 Step Standard figures rather than a configuration we are recommending. A live account would run the two percentages lower than this, for the reason in the next paragraph. The shape settings beside them, Measured from and Lock Floor At Profit, are the ones that should match the firm exactly. Every field here can be set per license, which matters because the shape follows the model rather than the account.
A guard only helps if it acts before the thing it guards against. Enter AquaFunded's exact percentage and our floor sits on the very level at which they close the account, with nothing between the two. Ours closes positions with a market order at whatever the spread is when the level is hit, so the fill lands past the number that triggered it. For PineHook to stop the account rather than report it, both guards have to sit below the published figures, with enough room left for a close to complete. How much depends on the size you trade and how fast your instruments move, so that call is yours. Matching the firm's numbers looks correct and protects nothing.
There is one more rule worth knowing before you point a grinding strategy at an evaluation. A trading day only counts toward the minimum if you made at least 0.5% profit on it, the 1 Step Standard and 2 Step Standard each need three such days, and both Instant models need five. A strategy that scratches out small wins can trade for a fortnight and satisfy fewer days than the calendar suggests.
News: capped rather than banned#
You may hold trades overnight and over the weekend, with no restriction either way. News trading is not banned at all. On every account opened after 27 April 2026, both evaluation and funded, AquaFunded caps what you may keep from it rather than forbidding it.
The window is five minutes either side of a red-folder release, FOMC speeches and statements included, and profit made inside it is tracked separately. At the end of the payout cycle you keep up to 0.5% of your starting balance, which is 500 dollars on a 100,000 account, and anything above that is removed. No penalty, no violation, no breach. Accounts bought before 27 April 2026 stay on the older rule, where news profit was removed without a cap. AquaFunded names the Forex Factory and Myfxbook calendars for which events count.
That changes what automation is for here. Because the cap limits profit rather than breaching the account, blocking news entries is a choice rather than a compliance need, which is the opposite of most firms in this category. PineHook's news filter holds new entries inside a window you set on either side of a release, and its prop firm preset is five minutes each way, which is AquaFunded's window exactly. Turn it on if you would rather not have news profit trimmed at payout, and leave it off if you would rather keep the trades. Closes and cancels pass through either way, because a filter that stopped you exiting during news would be worse than none.
The calendar in your dashboard, evaluated against one license running AquaFunded's five minutes either side. High-impact releases are held and medium ones are not, because medium is the opt-in checkbox and their rule is about red-folder events. Read this one as a planning tool rather than a compliance check: at AquaFunded the window costs you profit above the cap, not the account.
What counts against you is a trade filling in the window, and no automation can stop the market reaching a level already resting on your account. The filter governs what PineHook sends; a stop the price simply hits is between you and your broker. So on a funded account, look ahead at the News Calendar in your dashboard and plan around the releases sitting near your open positions.
Copy trading, and where AquaFunded draws the line#
AquaFunded answer this on two pages, and the wider one governs. Their copy-trading article names three permitted directions: between AquaFunded accounts, from Funded to Evaluation and back, and between an AquaFunded account and external accounts, allowed "only from personal accounts that are legally bound to the account holder". Their EA article mentions only "your own AquaFunded accounts", which is easy to read as the whole answer and is not.
So the boundary is ownership rather than the firm. Accounts you legally own are in scope wherever they are held, and copying someone else's trades is not. That is wider than several firms write.
That maps onto PineHook's trade copier. It gives you a Copier ID in the same format as a license key, and you put it in your alert where the license key normally goes, so one alert reaches every account you attached without maintaining three sets of alerts.
Percentage sizing handles the size difference on its own: send size_pct=1 and each account risks one percent of its own balance. Each license then adds a multiplier, and because it scales percentage sizing as well as fixed lots it acts as a risk dial rather than a lot dial. Set the account with the tightest drawdown to 0.5 and it takes half the risk of the others off the same alert. Where the arithmetic does not divide cleanly, a volume over a parameter's maximum is clamped rather than dropped, and one that rounds to zero is skipped and reported.
The copier has since grown into its own dashboard page, with a live fleet view and per-account pause. Nothing stops you running more than one copier, and at AquaFunded the reason to is the drawdown shape rather than the firm. A 1 Step trails your equity peak while a 2 Step Standard never moves, so the two need different guard settings and belong in different groups even though both sit at the same firm and take the same alert.
Two copiers, split by drawdown shape rather than by firm: the trailing models in one group, the static ones in the other, because a guard setting that suits one is wrong for the other. Both groups here hold AquaFunded accounts, though their rules would also allow an external account you own in either. Each group shows the same symbols at the same entry, because each group received one alert.
Who AquaFunded will not accept#
AquaFunded's restricted list has two tiers, which is unusual and worth reading before you buy rather than after.
Fully restricted, no account at all: Cuba, Iran, Syria, Vietnam, Kenya, Albania, Algeria, North Korea, Senegal, Myanmar, Russia, Belarus, Sudan, South Sudan, Venezuela, Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk.
Permitted with conditions: Thailand, Brazil, Bulgaria, Japan, Jordan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines may trade Instant Funding models only, capped at 50,000 dollars of funded capital per trader. That second tier is the one that catches people, because those countries are not restricted anywhere obvious and the limit applies to the model you are allowed to buy rather than to how you trade it.
FAQ#
Does PineHook work with my AquaFunded account? Yes, on an MT5 account. AquaFunded allow EAs used as part of your own personal strategy, which is what an alert-driven setup is.
Which drawdown mode should I use for AquaFunded? Trailing (floating) on the 1 Step and 2 Step Pro models, because their floor follows the higher of balance and equity. Static on the 2 Step Standard and the 3 Step. Set Lock Floor At Profit to 6 on the 1 Step Pro only.
When does my trading day reset? At 00:00 UTC, on the higher of your balance or equity at that moment. No timezone arithmetic, which is unusual among prop firms.
Can one alert trade several of my accounts at once? Yes. AquaFunded's copy-trading page permits copying between AquaFunded accounts, between Funded and Evaluation accounts, and between an AquaFunded account and your own external accounts, provided every account is legally yours.
Does the news rule apply to my account? On every account opened after 27 April 2026, evaluation and funded alike. Trading within five minutes either side of red-folder news is allowed, but profit from it is capped at 0.5% of your starting balance per payout cycle and anything above that is removed. No breach either way.
How fast do alerts reach my terminal? PineHook publishes its MT5 webhook-to-queue median daily on the status page. That timer ends before the alert reaches your terminal or the broker executes the trade.
Try it on your evaluation first#
If you hold an AquaFunded account, the sensible first step is also the cheapest. Attach the EA to your evaluation account's terminal, read your symbol names out of Market Watch, set the drawdown guard to the shape your model uses, and send a test alert. PineHook is free during the public beta, with no card required. More guides for other firms are collected in our guides hub, and our prop-firms page covers the guardrail features in depth.
AquaFunded is a trademark of its owner. PineHook is an independent service and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by AquaFunded, TradingView, or MetaQuotes.
