Started with €700 salary. Today $15,000 in payouts in three months. – Andre Witzel

If you scroll through the YouTube comments under Andre Witzel's videos, you'll find the same accusation popping up between serious questions: "Candle color changes? What kind of strategy is that supposed to be?" Andre knows these comments. He reads every single one. And he smirks at them — because he knows what the critics don't: that exact method took him from a €200 room in a shared flat in Hanover to Limassol, where he now lives surrounded by the headquarters of international brokers, platform developers, and professional traders.

Andre Witzel is the founder of Trading.de, one of the most personal trading education programs in the German-speaking world, and has been trading the markets full-time for over ten years. Together with his partner JT, he mentors more than 216 active traders on their path to profitability. His story shows why the supposedly boring strategy is often the most profitable one — and why prop trading has become a permanent part of his setup today.

2013: An Apprentice and an Idea

Andre's trading journey didn't start with a master plan. It started with a TV ad.

He was in the middle of an apprenticeship as an electronics technician at Mercedes-Benz, surrounded by colleagues who treated themselves to a new leased car every few months. Eighty percent of the workforce drove brand-new vehicles. Andre wanted the same — but on his own terms.

"I didn't want a lease. I wanted to buy a used AMG. Earned it myself, paid for it myself."

The problem: on a €700 apprentice salary, an AMG is an ambitious goal. Andre tried putting €500 a month aside. What sounds like a disciplined plan simply wasn't feasible in reality — even while he was still living with his parents. €200 a month to live on isn't enough, no matter how frugal you are. That failed attempt at saving became the real driving force: if saving alone couldn't finance the AMG, the money had to work differently.

He discovered a Swiss broker through a TV ad, started out with short-term options, then switched to CFDs. Those very first experiences were chaotic, aimless, and educational in the most expensive way possible. But the spark was lit.

The Golden Phase: From €10,000 to €100,000

A few years later, Andre's life had changed fundamentally. The Mercedes apprenticeship was behind him, he had enrolled at Fulda University of Applied Sciences for International Business, and had moved to Hanover — into a €200 room in a shared flat with a colleague. The building was a 1960s walk-up, the room was tiny, but it was right in the center of the city. By then, alongside his studies, Andre had already built a small business and was earning his first commissions from brokers he was creating content for.

His trading account sat at €10,000, slowly built up from the small returns of the previous years. He was trading gold, using a trend-following strategy, and working with volume profiles and fake-breakout setups. And then something happened that turned his life completely upside down for the months to come.

A student, early twenties, with a six-figure account balance. That day, Andre went to the barber and told him about it. The barber looked at him as if he'd lost his mind.

The Hard Reality Check

What Andre didn't understand in that moment: he hadn't suddenly become a brilliant trader. He had applied a trend strategy in a strongly trending market and used extreme leverage to do it. The combination worked — until the trend stopped.

The loss didn't just hit him financially. The euphoria of the gains had created a self-image that shattered in an instant. Andre describes the emotional crash matter-of-factly, but you can sense the scar is still there.

"You feel like you're the king. You think you can do anything. And then you lose and you get depressed. You're furious with yourself. You ask yourself what you did wrong. But in the moment when you're trading, you don't think about any of that. That's the problem."

Andre took a break. Not days — weeks. Then he came back, with less leverage, less risk, less ego. And with a realization that forms the foundation of his training program today.

The Strategy Nobody Takes Seriously — Yet It Works

Andre trades pullbacks in the trend. It sounds mundane, and that's exactly his edge.

His method works like this: he identifies a clear trend, waits for a pullback, and enters when the candle color changes and the structure of higher lows remains intact. Sometimes he waits for the market to move into a sideways phase, positions himself at the lower end with a tight stop, and lets the breakout in the trend direction do the work. Sometimes a single mini-pullback within an ongoing trend — one candle with a color change — is enough to justify the entry.

"A lot of people comment under our videos: What kind of bullshit is this? Candle color changes? What kind of strategy is that supposed to be? To them, it sounds too simple to be true."

But anyone who understands what's behind the color change recognizes a simple pullback within an ongoing trend. When the trend is truly strong, candles don't retrace far from the starting point — they keep forming higher lows. That's exactly where Andre enters.

His risk per trade is between €100 and €300, depending on market conditions. Two to three trades per day, maximum. Then he's done, no matter what the market does after that. He primarily day-trades the S&P 500 and uses gold, silver, Bitcoin, and EUR/USD for swing trades on higher timeframes.

Trading.de and Limassol

In 2021, Andre co-founded the platform Trading.de together with JT and moved to Cyprus that same year — first to Larnaca, then to Limassol, where the trading industry is concentrated. Today, the two of them personally mentor more than 216 active traders, with direct feedback on their trades and a single, clearly defined strategy that all participants trade together.

But Andre's story isn't that of a coach who made it because he built a business. It's the story of a trader who refined a simple method for so long that it became reliable. Trading.de was the result of that process, not the prerequisite for it.

Andre's Path Meets Prop Trading

When Andre looks back at his own beginnings today, he sees one thing above all: unnecessary risk. Years of saving to scrape together €10,000, only to put it all on the line with too much leverage in a single trend. Prop trading flips that equation entirely.

When Andre started out, prop trading in its current form didn't exist yet. Had that option been available, he would never have needed to risk his hard-saved €10,000. He could have started with an affordable challenge and traded with external capital instead of putting his own money at stake. But in 2016, that path didn't exist yet — so the hard way was the only way.

What Andre means by that: the built-in risk limits of a prop firm instill exactly the discipline that took him years and costly losses to develop on his own. A daily loss limit, a maximum position size, clear drawdown rules — all of these are guardrails that prevent a beginner from making the same mistake Andre made with his €100,000.

And the crucial point: you don't need significant capital of your own, nor do you need your own business. Andre's path led through founding Trading.de, but that's not a prerequisite for success. Some of his students are already trading on funded accounts with IQ Capital and received a combined payout of over €5,000 last month. They didn't start a platform, build a coaching business, or launch a YouTube channel. They simply learned the strategy, passed the challenge, and started trading with discipline.

For his own practice, Andre runs funded accounts in parallel with his private trading. He's doing the analysis anyway, he's identifying the setup regardless. So he executes the same trade on both accounts — once with his own capital, once with external capital.

What he emphasizes: he deliberately takes less risk on the funded account than on his private account. Not because he distrusts the rules, but because he operates more conservatively in prop trading and only slightly increases risk after the first profitable trades.

"Once the first profits are in and the trend is right, I size up a little. But not before. The strategy works on the prop account exactly the same as everywhere else."

His Strategy Pays Off: 5 Payouts in Three Months

Andre has been trading with IQ Capital since the beginning of 2026 and has received five payouts during that time, reflecting his growing progress on the funded accounts.

What he likes about IQ Capital is the transparency of the rulebook.

"With some prop firms, I took a payout and didn't realize it counted toward the drawdown. Then the account was suddenly gone. With IQ Capital, the rules are clear. You don't have to decode the fine print first."

In conversation with IQ Capital CEO Christoph Radecker, it became clear that both share a similar philosophy: rules should protect the trader, not punish them. Andre sees prop trading as a kind of trading license — one that gives young traders the opportunity to prove themselves, celebrate their first wins, and build on them.

Staying Honest, Even When It Hurts

What sets Andre apart from many other trading coaches: he talks openly about his bad trades. Not as a marketing gimmick, but because he believes that's exactly what makes the decisive difference.

A few days before the interview with Christoph, Andre had a swing trade running in the S&P 500 that was perfectly positioned and already well in profit. Then, at ten in the morning German time, Trump posted a message about alleged progress with Iran. The market exploded 300 points to the upside within minutes. Andre wasn't at his PC, was sitting in a meeting, and hadn't set a trailing stop.

"The entire profit was gone. In one minute, two minutes. Because of fake news that later turned out to be nothing. That was one of my worst trades ever."

His reaction? He put the screen away for several days. No charts, no market checks, no revenge trades. Just distance, until the emotions had subsided.

"Everyone who trades successfully and does this for a living has experienced something like that. Anyone who tells you they only win is lying. The market punishes arrogance, no matter how much experience you have and no matter how big your account is."

The Message Behind the Story

Andre Witzel's journey to Cyprus took over ten years — through painful losses, failed attempts at saving, and years of refinement. But the key takeaway of his story isn't how long the path was. The key takeaway is how much shorter it could be today.

When Andre started out on a €700 apprentice salary, he had to save for years just to build an account large enough to trade with. He had to risk his own money — his own €10,000 that he had scraped together month after month. And when he lost it, he was back to zero.

Today, someone in that exact same situation — with the same modest salary and the same ambition — can start a prop trading challenge for a fraction of that amount. Instead of spending years building up capital, they can prove their skills and trade with external capital. They don't need to start a trading education company, build a YouTube channel, or move to Cyprus. All they need is a strategy that works, the discipline to stick to their rules, and a prop firm that pays out fairly.

Andre's strategy fits into two sentences. His risk management is strict but uncomplicated. His daily routine allows for two to three trades, sometimes just a single one. The rest is waiting, observing, and having the discipline to turn off the screen when the day is done. The method that others laugh at is what brought him to Cyprus. Not because it's secret or genius, but because he executes it the same way every day — with the same risk, the same discipline, and the same respect for the market.

The difference between Andre in 2016 and a trader starting out today isn't talent. It's access. And that's exactly what prop trading provides.

Anyone who wants to see for themselves can find Andre live on YouTube, where he regularly shows trades in real time, and on Trading.de, where he and JT offer a trading education program with personal mentorship.