What is social trading?

What it means

Mechanically it is the same thing as copy trading. The difference is the discovery layer: instead of evaluating a track record, you browse a ranked list, and the ranking is doing the persuading.

Why it matters

That layer creates a specific distortion. Leaderboards sort by recent return, and the fastest way to the top of a return-sorted list is enormous risk that has not yet failed. The visible winners are therefore systematically the highest-risk providers in the pool, not the best ones. A provider running 40% drawdowns outranks one running 8% right up until the month they do not.

What this changes in practice

Read the ranking as a survivorship artefact. The useful columns are the ones the interface makes small — maximum drawdown, account age, deposit load and how many losing months are in the record. A two-month account at the top of a leaderboard has told you nothing except that two months went well.