What is a PAMM account?

You open an account at the broker and complete its identity verification yourself. Nobody opens it for you, and the account is in your name throughout.

You then allocate some or all of the balance to the master account. Your share of that master account is simply your capital divided by the total capital allocated by all participants. If you contribute one tenth of the pool, you receive one tenth of its gains and one tenth of its losses.

The manager trades the master account as a single portfolio. You do not place trades, choose position sizes, or set entries and exits while your allocation is active.

Custody stays with the regulated broker. Deposits, reporting and withdrawals are handled directly between you and that broker, which is the structural difference from a fund, where you transfer capital to the fund itself.

BlackRidge does not receive, hold or have withdrawal rights over client capital at any stage.

Suppose a master account holds $1,000,000 allocated across three investors: A has funded $500,000, B $300,000 and C $200,000. Shares of the pool are 50%, 30% and 20% respectively. If the master account gains 10% in a settlement period, the gain of $100,000 is distributed as $50,000 to A, $30,000 to B and $20,000 to C; each investor's balance grows by the same 10%. If the account loses 10%, each loses exactly their share: $50,000, $30,000 and $20,000. Allocation is pro-rata by capital, not by account size or seniority.

Most brokers settle a manager's performance allocation, where one applies, at defined intervals — monthly or at withdrawal — against each participant's share. At BlackRidge there is no performance allocation to settle: the one-time access payment is made before trading begins, so PAMM settlement at the broker concerns only your capital, your deposits and your withdrawals.

The example ignores broker spreads, commissions, swaps and slippage, which every participant bears through the master account's execution.

Withdrawals are requested from the broker under its PAMM terms, which set out notice periods, settlement timing and any restrictions while positions are open. The broker, not BlackRidge, executes the withdrawal. There is no exit fee from BlackRidge and no lock-in period.

Three parties are involved. The broker holds the accounts, verifies identity and executes deposits, withdrawals and allocation. The trading manager operates the master account and nothing else. BlackRidge researches and selects the strategy, introduces you to it, and supports the relationship; it never receives or holds client funds and has no withdrawal rights.

If the manager stops trading, the broker's PAMM terms govern what happens to allocations; typically positions are closed or transferred and participants' balances remain theirs at the broker. Read those terms before allocating.

PAMM is one of three common ways to let someone else trade on your behalf at a broker. All three keep the account in your name; they differ in how a trade is shared out and how much control you keep.

In a PAMM account every trade is placed once on the master account and its result is divided by each participant's percentage of the pooled equity. In a MAM (Multi-Account Manager) setup the manager also places one block order, but the platform splits it across individual sub-accounts by lot size, equity or a per-account multiplier, so two clients can carry different risk on the same trade. In copy trading the platform replicates a provider's trades into your own account, usually in proportion to your balance, and you can typically pause copying, change the size or close a position yourself.

Fees and terms are set by the broker or platform in each case, not by the structure, so read them for the specific offer.

Read the broker's PAMM terms in full. They set out how profit is calculated and distributed, any notice period for withdrawals, when settlement occurs, and what happens if the manager stops trading.

Confirm the broker's regulatory status independently rather than relying on a description of it.

Understand that your result depends on the performance of the whole master account. Because capital is pooled, you cannot opt out of individual positions.

Look at the length of the track record and whether it is calculated by the broker from the master account rather than reported by the manager. A few strong months on a small balance says little.

Check the maximum drawdown and how long recovery took, the leverage and position sizes used, and whether returns held up as allocated capital grew. Many broker rating pages also show how much of the manager's own capital is in the master account.

Read the performance fee, the high-water mark rule, the settlement interval and the withdrawal notice period in the broker's PAMM terms, and confirm the broker's regulator and legal entity yourself on the regulator's register.

A PAMM structure improves custody and transparency. It does not reduce market risk. The strategy can lose money, and leveraged trading can lose it quickly.

You are also exposed to the manager's decisions, to the broker's execution, spreads and solvency, and to the possibility that a strategy which worked historically stops working.