Title Transfer Collateral Arrangement (TTCA)

A title transfer collateral arrangement is an agreement under which a client transfers full ownership of money or assets to a firm as collateral, instead of the firm holding them on the client's behalf. The distinction decides what happens if the firm fails: money held as client money sits in segregated accounts and is returned ahead of general creditors, whereas money transferred under a TTCA has legally become the firm's own, leaving the client with a contractual claim that ranks alongside everyone else the firm owes. Under the MiFID framework and its UK equivalent, firms may not enter into these arrangements with retail clients at all. They are permitted with professional clients, subject to the firm assessing that the arrangement is appropriate and disclosing what it means. That makes it one of the concrete things handed back when a retail trader opts up to professional status, and it is worth reading the client agreement specifically for the clause, because the protection disappears through wording rather than through anything visible in the platform.