The CME Professional Data Fee Explained ($135 a Month)
What it is, why a funded futures account gets charged it, and exactly when it starts.
The CME Professional data fee is a monthly, per-exchange charge the exchange bills any futures trader whose account is classified as a professional market data user. At Phoenix Trader Funding that classification only attaches once an account is trading real capital at a broker, which means the Live stage, trading at EdgeClear on Rithmic.
Phoenix Trader Funding charges exactly $135 a month per exchange once an account reaches Live, and the fee never applies during the evaluation or the simulated Pre-Funded stage before it.
- What "Professional" Market Data Means
- When the Fee Starts: Evaluation, Pre-Funded, Live
- What the Fee Costs, Per Exchange
- Which Exchange Your Contracts Sit On
- What the Fee Comes Out Of
A trader who clears an evaluation and starts asking what else might cost money eventually runs into this one. It is real, it recurs every month, and it is not part of the evaluation price: it only applies once an account is Live, and it is deducted directly from the account.
What "Professional" Market Data Means
Futures exchanges split real-time market data access into two billing tiers. A non-professional user is someone viewing data to trade their own personal account with their own capital. A professional user is anyone whose trading is tied to a business, a fund, or capital that belongs to a firm rather than to them personally.
The distinction is not about skill or account size. It is about whose money is being traded. At Phoenix Trader Funding that line is crossed only once an account is Live, trading real capital through EdgeClear on Rithmic.
Exchanges bill real-time data at a higher rate to professional users than to retail ones.
When the Fee Starts: Evaluation, Pre-Funded, Live
A funded futures account does not carry the same status for its entire life. It moves through stages, and the professional data classification only attaches to one of them.
During the evaluation, a trader works against a simulated balance to prove a result, and no real capital, firm or personal, is on the line yet, so the professional billing trigger never fires.
Passing moves the account into Pre-Funded, a simulated funded account that already pays real payouts on simulated trading. It sits closer to funded than to an evaluation, but it is still a simulation underneath, and the fee still does not apply there either.
The fee begins only at the third stage, when an account moves to Live and starts trading real capital at EdgeClear on Rithmic instead of a simulation. That is the point where the exchange's professional classification has something real to attach to, and billing starts.
How soon an account reaches Live depends on the family.
- Classic and Spark: Live after 4 payouts plus a risk approval
- Daily: Live on lifetime amount paid, $1,200 Seed / $3,000 Starter / $6,000 Growth
- Merit: Live immediately on approval, with no Pre-Funded stage first
Merit is the outlier worth naming directly: it skips Pre-Funded entirely, so an accepted trader goes straight to a $2,000 Live account after its 30 calendar day assessment, and the CME Professional fee can start as soon as that account opens rather than after a string of payouts. The Merit account rules cover the rest of what changes at approval.
For every other family, the fee cannot apply until an account has already proven itself twice over, once by passing and again by earning its way to Live.
What the Fee Costs, Per Exchange
Once an account reaches Live, the fee is $135 a month per exchange, deducted straight from the account itself rather than billed as a separate card charge. The tradable list covers CME, CBOT, COMEX and NYMEX futures.
It is worth separating this from the other data cost on the books, because the two get confused constantly. Level 1 market data, the basic price feed, comes bundled with dxFeed at no extra charge on every account type that uses it.
Depth of market, the order-book view some traders want for execution, is a separate optional add-on on dxFeed at $15 a month per exchange, or $40 a month for a four-exchange bundle, available during the evaluation and the simulated Pre-Funded stage.
| Data charge | When it applies | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Level 1 price data (dxFeed) | dxFeed, evaluation and Pre-Funded | Included |
| Level 2 depth of market | dxFeed, evaluation and Pre-Funded, optional | $15/mo per exchange, or $40/mo for 4 |
| CME Professional designation | Live only | $135/mo per exchange |
TFeed is the only feed Spark and Daily run on, and the only feed Merit runs on at all, so three of the four families never see either dxFeed row above. TFeed carries no market data, and a trader on it needs a separate leader account with data.
See the full Classic account pricing and data feed options.
Which Exchange Your Contracts Sit On
The fee is quoted per exchange, and the four exchanges list different contracts.
| Exchange | Contracts it lists |
|---|---|
| CME | ES, NQ, RTY, SOFR futures |
| CBOT | ZN, ZB, ZF, YM |
| COMEX | GC, SI |
| NYMEX | CL, NG |
Each micro contract sits on the same exchange as its full-size parent, so a micro E-mini S&P trader is on CME exactly like a full-size ES trader.
A trader working only CME symbols, ES and NQ for example, stays on one exchange. A trader pairing ES with a Treasury position in ZN is on two, CME and CBOT, because the two contracts sit on different exchanges regardless of how the account itself is structured.
What the Fee Comes Out Of
$135 a month per exchange is a real, recurring cost, deducted directly from the Live account it applies to. Live starting balances are $400 or $1,000 on Spark, $500, $1,250 or $2,000 on Daily, $1,250, $2,000 or $3,500 on Classic, and $2,000 on Merit.
The $135 charge does not scale with account size: a $400 Spark Seed Live account and a $3,500 Classic Scale Live account are billed the same $135 per exchange per month.
FAQ
What is the CME Professional data fee?
It is a monthly, per-exchange market data charge that futures exchanges bill to any account classified as trading professional or firm capital rather than a trader's own personal money. A Phoenix Trader Funding account is only classified this way once it reaches Live and trades real capital at EdgeClear on Rithmic.
Does the CME Professional fee apply during a futures prop firm evaluation?
No. The fee applies only once an account reaches the Live stage and trades real capital in a Live account at EdgeClear. It never applies during the evaluation or the simulated Pre-Funded stage.
How much is the CME Professional fee at Phoenix Trader Funding?
$135 a month per exchange, deducted directly from the account.
When does the fee start on a Merit account?
As soon as its Live account opens. Merit skips the Pre-Funded stage entirely: after its 30 calendar day assessment, an accepted trader moves straight to a $2,000 Live account, live-funded immediately on approval. Classic and Spark reach Live after 4 payouts plus a risk approval; Daily reaches Live on lifetime amount paid.
Is this the same charge as Level 2 market data?
No, they are separate charges. Level 2 depth of market is an optional add-on on dxFeed, available during the evaluation and the simulated Pre-Funded stage, for $15 a month per exchange or $40 a month for a four-exchange bundle. The CME Professional fee only starts at the Live stage and is not optional once an account reaches it.
See what it takes to reach a funded account in the first place.
Compare Phoenix Trader Funding evaluationsNew funded-account types are trialled at Phoenix Labs as real, tradable accounts before they join the permanent offer. The ones that work graduate; the ones that do not are retired.