He Quit Physical Therapy to Trade $1 Million with Axi Select
From Physical Therapist to $1 Million Funded Trader
Francisco's path into trading started unexpectedly. While visiting his brother's room one day, he noticed a chart of oil prices on a computer screen. Curiosity quickly turned into obsession. What began as research evolved into a six-year trading journey, including four years of manual trading followed by two years focused on algorithmic systems. Today, that journey has culminated in reaching Pro M status with Axi Select, securing access to $1 million in funded capital. While the milestone is impressive, Francisco is quick to point out that most of his success has come within the last year after refining his approach and fully embracing systematic trading.
Why Algorithms Solved His Biggest Trading Problem
For Francisco, the biggest advantage of algorithmic trading is psychological. Manual traders often tie losses directly to their own decision-making, which can make extended drawdowns emotionally exhausting. Algorithmic systems change that dynamic. Instead of personally deciding every trade, the system executes according to predefined rules and statistical expectations. That separation allows Francisco to view losing streaks as part of the process rather than personal failures. Even when performance slows, he trusts the data because every outcome falls within the expected range of the system.
Trusting Statistics Through Winning and Losing Cycles
One of the most interesting parts of Francisco's approach is how he thinks about drawdowns. He explains that even successful systems can experience several difficult months before recovering. Instead of reacting emotionally, he focuses on long-term probabilities. Some periods generate losses, while others recover those losses and create substantial gains in a matter of weeks. By treating trading as a statistical process rather than a daily scorecard, he avoids the emotional rollercoaster that often causes traders to abandon profitable systems too early.
Building Hundreds of Systems to Find a Few Winners
Francisco's process is heavily research driven. While only a handful of systems actively trade his Axi Select account, he has developed hundreds of strategies over time. Every system undergoes extensive backtesting, often using roughly ten years of historical market data. He searches for strategies that combine realistic win rates with strong reward-to-risk profiles, then evaluates how they perform across different market conditions. The goal is not to find perfection. It is to find a statistical edge that can survive both winning and losing periods.
Simple Rules, Strong Psychology, and Risk Management
Despite the complexity behind algorithmic trading, Francisco believes most traders fail for surprisingly simple reasons. Overtrading, abandoning plans, and poor risk management remain the biggest mistakes he sees. His advice for newer traders is straightforward: focus on psychology and protect capital first. Reaching $1 million in funding did not come from chasing trades or predicting markets perfectly. It came from following a structured process, trusting proven systems, and maintaining discipline through both good periods and bad ones.
Trading Strategy/ Mindset
Matt Anderson’s Trading Strategy with DNA Funded
Francisco approaches trading very differently than most discretionary traders. Rather than making individual decisions based on what he sees on the chart each day, he relies on algorithmic systems that execute trades according to predefined rules. This removes much of the emotional pressure that comes with manual trading and allows him to focus on probabilities rather than individual outcomes.
His systems are primarily trend-following strategies that operate on 30-minute and 1-hour charts. Before deploying a strategy, he typically backtests it using approximately ten years of historical data. He looks for systems that maintain win rates between 40% and 60% while producing reward-to-risk ratios of 2-to-1, 4-to-1, or better. This allows the strategy to remain profitable even when losing trades occur frequently.
Although Francisco has developed hundreds of systems over the years, only a small number are actively trading at any given time. Gold has been one of his most successful markets, particularly during the period he progressed through the Axi Select program. As a day trader, positions generally last from minutes to several hours and are rarely held beyond a single trading day.
What stands out most about Francisco's approach is his willingness to trust the data. He understands that losing streaks are part of the statistical profile of every system. Rather than modifying strategies after a few bad trades, he evaluates performance over large sample sizes and allows the probabilities to play out over time.