Episode Details
Back to Episodes
He Got Tired Of Prop Firms... So He Built an AI Hedge Fund
Description
Dylan Maltman of Apex Capital Management (Cape Town) joins the show to break down how he went from a banned retail prop trader to running an AI-native futures hedge fund.
He details Apex's origin story, the difference between proprietary trading and challenge-based prop firms, and how Apex structures capital raising through SMAs vs. LPGP vehicles.
🎯 Sponsor: Prop Firm Match — Compare 40+ prop firms side-by-side.
Code MATCH
🔗 https://www.propfirmmatch.com/?a_aid=asfx
🔄 TradeSyncer — 30% off w/ code ASFX
🎥 Trade Live With Me — Free 30-day trial
🔗 https://www.asfx.biz/first
🧠TradeZella — 20% off w/ code ASFX
He dives deep into daily operations — fully automated order-flow strategies run on the Sierra platform with Chicago colocation for millisecond latency — and explains why Apex doesn't do manual or discretionary trades, instead selling investors on a consistent risk/return distribution.
He also unpacks how AI now touches every part of the fund's research and execution pipeline, and closes with a technical breakdown of the order book square root law and why speed matters in delta/order-flow trading.
Connect with Dylan - https://za.linkedin.com/in/dylan-maltman-8b575b1b1
00:01:22 – Dylan joins from Cape Town; intro and backstory with Austin
00:03:53 – What Apex Capital actually is: proprietary trading firm, not a challenge-based prop firm
00:05:09 – Dylan's background: crypto prop shop, sell-side derivatives, then going independent
00:06:01 – Getting banned from retail challenges, the Luxembourg hedge fund offer, and founding Apex in 2024
00:08:16 – Entrepreneurial mindset: separating the fantasy of trading from the reality
00:10:00 – Designing Apex's capital structure around survivability, not high-growth VC style
00:12:31 – Day-to-day life as a fund manager: strategy design, P&L checks, watching latency
00:17:17 – Why Apex uses Sierra platform and Chicago colocation instead of building custom tech yet
00:18:01 – What it was like raising capital in the early days vs. now
00:23:01 – Apex's niche: asymmetric strategies for hedge funds and prop groups focused on drawdown
00:26:35 – How scaling client allocations works, from starting ticket to max cap
00:29:00 – SMA structure explained: how client money never touches Dylan directly
00:33:00 – Latency and risk engine allocation across sub-accounts explained
00:36:34 – Why Apex is fully automated with no manual/discretionary trades
00:44:19 – Biggest mistake: a risk-sizing error on a new order management system import
00:50:59 – Order book square root law explained — why speed matters in delta/order-flow trading
00:56:09 – Closing thoughts and where to find Dylan and Apex Capital