One Prop Trader a Day – Steeve Marc Lee Fils-Aimé: Faith, 30+ Failed Challenges and a First Payout

One Prop Trader a Day – Episode 121

What does it take to keep going after more than 30 failed challenges? Steeve Marc Lee Fils-Aimé, 31 and from Haiti, started in 2022 with binary options and was scammed by people he met online, became consistently profitable in 2025, and received his first payout of 1,042 dollars from Blueberry Funded in April 2025. In this interview, he explains how Bible reading and worship music open every trading day, why he trades Exhaustion Wicks together with the macroeconomic picture, and what he would focus on in the first seven days of a 1,000,000 dollar funded account.

My name is Steeve Marc Lee Fils-Aimé. I’m 31 years old and I’m from Haiti. I’m a trader, and I mainly trade the U.S. stock indices, especially Nasdaq and other major American indices, as well as Gold.

My journey in trading has been far from easy. I started in 2022, and honestly, I started in probably one of the worst ways possible. I got involved in binary options and was eventually scammed by people I met online. At that time, I believed trading was simply about putting money somewhere and waiting for it to grow. I had a lot to learn.

I became consistently profitable in 2025, and that was a major turning point for me. Before that, I had spent years making mistakes and trying to understand what I was doing wrong. I learned mainly through free content. I watched traders such as Elliot Hewitt, Cue Banks and MadCharts, and I also followed a free training from Top Tier Academy in 2024. My first payout came in April 2025 from Blueberry Funded. It was 1,042 dollars. That payout was important to me because it was the first real proof that all the years of studying, failing and trying again could actually lead somewhere.

With my first payout, I bought some clothes and, more importantly, I shared some of the money with my family. For me, it wasn’t really about the clothes or the money itself. It was the feeling of being able to tell myself, “This is real. I actually made this through trading.” After everything I had gone through since 2022, that first payout meant a lot.

I failed more than 30 challenges. It could probably have been even more if my income had allowed me to take more challenges. There were definitely moments when I thought trading simply wasn’t for me. But I never completely gave up. A big part of what kept me going was my spiritual life. I believe God had a plan behind everything I was going through. There were moments when I felt like I was being reminded not to give up. So even after another failure, I kept learning. I don’t see my journey as simply being about becoming a better trader. It has also been about perseverance, discipline and faith.

The most expensive lesson wasn’t one specific amount of money. It was the cost of repeating the same mistakes over and over again. In my early trading, I would trade with full margin, sometimes without a stop-loss, and I would put far too much risk on individual trades. I also neglected the fundamental side of the market. I was focusing too much on getting into trades and not enough on understanding why the market was moving. The real breakthrough came when I started trading with an actual plan, controlling my risk and paying much more attention to macroeconomic factors and market news. That change made a huge difference.

Trading absolutely took a mental and emotional toll. After more than 30 failed challenges, there were moments when I questioned myself and wondered if I was wasting my time. Today, I understand that psychology is one of the most important parts of trading. I don’t want trading to control my emotions anymore. I want my process to control my decisions. That’s also why my trading day starts with something completely separate from the markets: my spiritual life. I start with Bible reading, evangelical worship music and a real moment of connection with God. It helps me get into the right mental state before I even think about taking a trade.

I’ve traded with different prop firms, including Blueberry Funded, E8 Markets and Alpha Capital. Blueberry Funded was particularly important in my journey because that’s where I received my first payout. With E8 Markets, I managed to pass a free challenge in December 2024, but unfortunately I wasn’t able to receive a payout. I eventually had to leave the firm because of restrictions related to my country and the available payout method. The last prop firm I traded with was Alpha Capital, and currently I’m not trading with any prop firm. When I look at a prop firm, I care about the rules, transparency, payout conditions and, very importantly, whether traders from my country can actually operate and receive their payouts without unnecessary restrictions.

Today, my approach is very different from when I started. I mainly trade U.S. indices and Gold. My strategy is based around Exhaustion Wicks, particularly when they occur around important support and resistance areas. But I don’t look at the setup in isolation. I also consider the macroeconomic environment and the fundamental factors affecting the market. I wait for my alerts and for the right conditions instead of forcing trades. The biggest change in my trading is that I now understand that having a setup is not enough. I want the technical picture and the macroeconomic context to make sense together.

A good trading day for me actually starts before I look at a chart. I start with Bible reading and evangelical worship music. I want to have a real spiritual connection before I begin trading. Then I prepare myself mentally and look at the market environment. I pay attention to the macroeconomic calendar, important economic events and the overall context of the indices and Gold. After that, I wait. I don’t want to spend the whole day clicking buttons just because the market is moving. I wait for my alerts and for my setup to appear. For me, trading is about patience.

My most recent losing trade was on the Nasdaq, where I had taken a long position. The important thing for me wasn’t simply that the trade lost. I had to recognize the risk and reduce my exposure. That’s something I wouldn’t have done in the same way when I started trading. Back then, I was willing to use excessive margin and trade without proper protection. Today, a losing trade is part of the business. What I would do differently is continue to demand as much confirmation as possible before entering and make sure the risk is appropriate for the setup. I’ve learned that protecting the account is more important than being right on one trade.

My first payout was 1,042 dollars with Blueberry Funded in April 2025. My biggest payout so far has been 1,600 dollars, also with Blueberry Funded. The amount could have been different, but there were restrictions on the amount I could withdraw through crypto. For me, however, the biggest milestone isn’t necessarily the 1,600 dollars. The biggest milestone was becoming profitable after everything I went through. Going from being scammed in binary options, failing more than 30 challenges and questioning whether trading was even for me, to finally receiving payouts, that is the milestone I’m most proud of.

At the beginning, the people around me didn’t really understand what I do. Because nobody around me was involved in trading, people thought I was crazy. But over time, their perception changed. They saw that I wasn’t simply talking about trading, I was actually staying committed to it, learning from my mistakes and continuing despite all the failures. Eventually, I gained their respect for my perseverance. Today, I’ve even started teaching other people what I’ve learned.

Honestly, I don’t think I’m necessarily better than someone who quit after three failures. I think there is an element of divine favor in my journey. I believe trading was part of God’s plan for me, and that belief gave me the strength to keep going when things weren’t working. But faith alone isn’t enough. I also continued learning. Every failure showed me something I needed to change. I went from trading with full margin and no stop-loss, to understanding risk management. I went from ignoring fundamentals, to paying attention to macroeconomic conditions. I went from forcing trades, to waiting for my alerts and my setups. So I think the difference is not that I never failed.

If you gave me a 1,000,000 dollar funded account today, the first thing I would focus on would not be making money. It would be my psychology. A 1 million dollar account would create a completely different psychological environment, and I would want to make sure I was mentally prepared before taking any serious risk. I wouldn’t feel the need to trade immediately just because the account was available. I would study the market, understand the firm’s rules, establish my risk parameters and wait for a setup with as much confirmation as possible. My objective would be to start the challenge in profit rather than trying to make a large amount of money quickly. After everything I’ve learned throughout my journey, I understand one thing very clearly.

And if I could give one message to another trader, it would be simple: Don’t let your failures convince you that you’re not meant to succeed. Learn from them, control your risk, stay patient, keep learning, and never forget why you started.

Verified funded – the receipts