Avantis Zero-Fee Perpetuals: Public Beta

A 0–1 perpetual built for high leverage, loss-averse traders.

Why pay any fees if you’re already down?

Zero-fee perpetuals is a net new derivative built for high leverage & loss-averse traders currently live on Avantis (in public beta) for BTC, SOL, and ETH with up to 250x leverage.

Rethinking Perpetuals: The Problem

A “perpetual” implies a leveraged position that can theoretically be held forever. In reality, perp traders pay funding costs, borrow costs (on AMMs), and other fixed fees, meaning their position decays and can be liquidated over time even if the market doesn’t move against them.

Traditional perpetuals have proven ineffective for loss-averse traders, with data showing that over 90% of traders lose money trading with leverage after fees.

The Word “Perpetual” is a Misnomer

Your position can still be liquidated, even if price doesn’t move against you. But how?

• Orderbook (CLOBs) DEXs and CEXs charge funding rates for taking the popular side. If you hold for too long, these fees lead to liquidations. Crypto markets are typically long-biased, meaning long traders constantly pay funding fees to short traders.
• AMMs like Avantis, GMX, and Gains charge borrowing fees that eat into profits and cause liquidations over time.

Additionally, traditional perps create several economic inefficiencies:

• Fixed fees reduce your alpha: Traders always need a certain price move to “break even” on costs
• Changing liquidation prices (impacted by funding/borrow fees) creates inefficient risk management
• Borrow fees (or funding rates) erode your collateral over time.

Introducing Zero-fee Perpetuals

Avantis is proud to introduce Zero-fee Perpetuals, DeFi’s first true “perpetual” designed specifically for loss-averse traders. This revolutionary product enables traders to open positions while only paying a fraction of their profits (if any) upon closing.

This means: no fixed opening fee, no closing fee, and no borrowing fee if your gross PnL is negative.

For the first time in DeFi, Zero-fees until you win!

How Zero-fee Perpetuals Work

Let’s walk through an example:

• Bob wants to open a BTC long trade using zero-fee perps
• He can open a position size of $1M (with $10K collateral at 100x leverage) for free

This means:

• No opening fees
• No slippage (on opening or closing trades)
• No borrow fees (“holding costs”)

As the trade progresses, one of two things can happen:

1. Bob is right, and his gross PnL is positive If the price moves 1% in his favor with 100x leverage, he’s now up 100% on his collateral (1% × $1M / $10K). Only then does Bob shares a fraction of his profits in fees.
2. Bob is wrong, and his gross PnL is negative Bob doesn’t pay any close fees, borrow fees, or slippage while closing the trade.

In the first scenario, Bob made profits without paying any fees upfront, plus he earned Avantis XP. In the second scenario, Bob only lost on gross PnL due to market movements but didn’t give up any portion of his collateral to fees, and he still earned Avantis XP!

This model allows traders to hold positions much longer than with traditional perps, and fees are only shared after traders are profitable, closely aligning the interests of the protocol, LPs, and traders.

The Economics of Zero-fee Perpetuals

Profit sharing (win-fees) varies based on an important outcome: your ROI. Zero-fee perps are designed to reward higher returns: As your ROI increases, you keep a larger percentage of your profits.

Profit sharing can be as low as 2.5% of your gross profits. This encourages traders to cash out when they’re most profitable while ensuring LPs are fairly compensated for allowing traders to enter and exit positions without paying fixed or borrowing fees.

Quantitative Comparison: Fixed Fees vs. Zero-fee Perps

To understand whether fixed-fee trading or zero-fee perps is better for you, let’s compare net PnL in relation to underlying crypto asset price movements and leverage.

Key Assumptions

Zero-fee perps:

• Zero fees for losing trades
• Variable profit-sharing (win-fees) as low as 2.5% of gross PnL, based on ROI

Fixed fees:

• 0.06% open/close fees for BTC (charged on position size)
• Borrow Fees: 10% APR, charged on position size

Duration: 7-day holding period

Collateral: $100 with varying leverage (10x-100x)

Key Takeaways

🔴 With fixed-fee perps, you need a much larger price move just to break even.

🟢 With zero-fee perps, small price moves can still be profitable, making it a far better model for most traders, especially loss-averse ones.

🔴 With fixed-fee perps, position decay is much higher as borrow fees eat into collateral over time. The impact is even larger for positions held longer than 7 days.

🟢 Zero-fee perps have zero borrow fees, allowing traders to hold positions much longer without any change in liquidation price.

Public Beta

Zero-fee perpetuals are currently in beta for BTC, SOL, and ETH with up to 250x leverage. All parameters are subject to change based on protocol risk and trader feedback.

Learn more: https://docs.avantisfi.com/trading/zero-fee-perpetuals-zfp

Join our Discord for early access and support: discord.gg/avantisfi

Start trading zero-fee perpetuals today at www.avantisfi.com