Anyone else hitting a wall with KYB/onboarding for new prop firms focused on commodities?

asked by u/fokafor · 6d · 3 answers

Been looking at expanding my exposure into some less liquid commodities recently, specifically some agricultural futures that aren't on my main broker's book, or if they are, the margins are just ridiculous. Found a couple of prop firms advertising access and better leverage/margins for this stuff, which is great on paper.

Problem is, the onboarding process has been an absolute nightmare. It's like they've never dealt with a professional trader before. The KYB requirements are scattershot – some asking for bank statements from five years ago, others rejecting perfectly valid utility bills for no clear reason. And the timeframes? I'm talking weeks, sometimes over a month, just to get past the initial checks, only for them to come back and ask for more 'clarification' on something utterly trivial. It's severely impacting my ability to react to market shifts when I'm waiting this long to get capital deployed.

Is this just the new normal, or am I hitting a bad patch of operators? How are others managing to get set up efficiently with these newer or more niche platforms, especially for commodities where timing is often everything? My main broker has been solid for years, but their scope for certain commodities is limited.

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Top answers

  • u/thomas.wilson· 11 pts· 6d

    Yeah, I've noticed that too. It's like the more niche the market, the more hoops you have to jump through with KYB. Makes me wonder if it's due to the lower trading volumes or just firms being extra cautious with less familiar asset classes.

  • u/vsiddiqui· 0 pts· 6d

    That's super interesting! I'm still mostly focused on equities, but I've been curious about commodities. Are the KYB issues mostly around document verification, or more about understanding the specific risk profiles for those commodity markets?

  • u/hugo.weber· 0 pts· 6d

    Yeah, I've noticed that too. It seems like the more niche the market, the more hoops they make you jump through, which is a real pain when you're just trying to diversify a bit.

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