Goat Funded
Trader (GFT), a retail proprietary trading firm, informed its clients this week
that it’s introducing a new platform, TradeLocker, to its offerings. This move
came shortly before a less pleasant announcement: the withdrawal (once again)
of services from MetaTrader platforms. Traders who had been using MetaQuotes
tools are now being migrated to MatchTrader.

Goat Funded Trader Gives
One Platform and Takes Another

GFT was
among the first companies to withdraw MetaTrader in February 2024 due to
licensing issues. A month ago, the firm announced that MetaQuotes trading tools
were returning to its lineup.

However,
the joy of Goat Funded Trader’s clients was short-lived. On Thursday morning,
the prop firm’s CEO, Edoardo Dalla Torre, announced on Discord that it was
necessary to withdraw again from offering “Platform4,” or MetaTrader
4.

“Due
to multiple outages of Platform4 and our continuous commitment to ensure our
traders have a good trading experience, all Platform4 accounts will now be
migrated to MatchTrader,” Dalla Torre stated.

He added
that all open positions would be closed and account balances transferred to new
accounts within MatchTrader.

The company
is reportedly working “on integrating better and more stable options for
Platform4 and Platform5, ensuring that we can also offer mobile versions once
they’re available again.”

Are
licensing issues once again the problem? It’s hard to say, but it appears the
platform had been preparing for this move for several days, announcing the
launch of a new platform at the beginning of the week.

Officially,
GFT announced the addition of TradeLocker to its suite of trading platforms on
July 17, a day before the decision to withdraw from MT4. This information
appeared on both X (formerly Twitter) and the company’s Discord.

TradeLocker, alongside MatchTrader, has become one of the more frequently chosen platforms that prop firms decide to migrate to after experiencing issues with MetaTrader. For example, Top Tier Trader made such a move in February.

Prop Firms’ Struggles with
MetaTrader

The prop
trading industry’s problems with MetaQuotes platforms began five months ago
when Purple Trading, which grey-labeled its MetaTrader license to prop trading
entities, withdrew from its previous agreements.

Due to
regulatory changes in the United States, the owner of MetaTrader began cracking
down on the prop industry and forced Purple to terminate their services to prop
firms. These firms started switching to alternative platforms, although many
have since re-offered MetaTrader to their clients.

However,
GFT’s example shows that the problems may still need to be fully resolved, and MT4
and MT5 remain problematic for firms in the sector. At the same time, they face
growing competition from regulated FX/CFD brokers who have also started
offering prop challenges to their clients. Their advantage lies in having
long-standing and direct agreements with MetaQuotes, allowing them to offer the
most popular platforms among retail traders without any interruptions or
controversies.