Direct answer
A 10,000 USDT position opened and closed as a taker at 0.05% pays 10 USDT in fees round trip. Held for seven days it crosses about 21 settlements, so at +0.01% a long pays 21 USDT of funding, for a total of 31 USDT, 0.31% of notional. At +0.03% the total rises to 73 USDT, and with maker fills on both sides it falls to 25 USDT — the longer the hold, the more funding outweighs fees.
Baseline scenario
Assume 10,000 USDT notional and an example taker fee of 0.05% on both entry and exit. Each side costs 5 USDT, so round-trip trading fees total 10 USDT.
Seven days at three settlements per day could cross 21 intervals. The actual count depends on the contract schedule and whether the position remains open at each timestamp; days alone are not sufficient.
Funding scenarios
At a constant +0.01% per interval, a long pays 1 USDT each time, or 21 USDT across 21 intervals. Adding round-trip fees gives a 31 USDT example total. At +0.03%, funding becomes 63 USDT and total cost 73 USDT.
With a negative rate the long may receive funding, potentially reducing net cost below trading fees. That receipt is not trading profit; price PnL can be much larger in either direction.
The three execution scenarios side by side
Side by side, the three scenarios show something the arithmetic above did not make obvious: the fee column moves by 6 USDT while the funding column is identical in all three rows.
That is the defining feature of perpetual cost structure: the longer the hold, the less fees matter relative to funding. At seven days funding is already 68% of the all-taker total; hold thirty days at the same rate and the fee share falls to roughly 10%.
| Execution scenario | Round-trip fees | Funding (21 intervals @ +0.01%) | Example total | Share of notional |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| All maker (0.02% / 0.02%) | 4.00 USDT | 21.00 USDT | 25.00 USDT | 0.250% |
| Maker in / taker out | 7.00 USDT | 21.00 USDT | 28.00 USDT | 0.280% |
| All taker (0.05% / 0.05%) | 10.00 USDT | 21.00 USDT | 31.00 USDT | 0.310% |
What scales with size and what does not
In this model both fees and funding are proportional to notional, so the total cost rate — the percentage of notional — does not move with size. The 0.31% on 10,000 USDT is the same 0.31% on 100,000 USDT.
Three things do not scale proportionally. Slippage usually grows with size because a larger order eats deeper into the book. The maintenance-margin rate can rise as notional crosses a tier. And in thin liquidity the realised exit price on a large position can sit well away from the quoted level.
Multiplying a small test through is therefore risky. The cost rate extrapolates; execution quality does not. When size grows by an order of magnitude, measure the gap between realised average fill and quoted price again and feed that back in as the new slippage input.
- Scales proportionally: opening fee, closing fee, funding per interval, total cost rate.
- Does not scale proportionally: slippage, maintenance tier, realised fills on partial exits.
- Does not change at all: the number of settlements, which follows time and the contract schedule, not size.
Maker does not mean zero cost
If both fills execute as maker at 0.02%, the example round trip is 4 USDT, 6 USDT below the taker case. A resting order can remain unfilled, partially fill or become a taker order when chased.
Maintain at least three budgets: all maker, all taker, and maker entry with taker stop. A risk exit should not assume a passive fill is guaranteed.
Build your own seven-day budget
Use the signed-in fee page for your maker/taker tier, record the next funding timestamp and current rate, then calculate low, central and high funding scenarios.
Add separate allowances for slippage, tax and transfers. DZPTO's total includes only displayed components and is not every economic cost of holding for seven days.
Official sources and calculation boundary
The three sources cover fee calculation, the funding settlement mechanism and the structure of the fee schedule. The 0.05% and +0.01% used here are fixed so the arithmetic can be followed step by step; neither is a live value from any particular moment.
- OKX: futures trading fee calculation
- OKX: perpetual futures funding fee FAQ
- Binance: futures fee schedule
Next checks in this series
Frequently asked questions
Are there always 21 funding events in seven days?
No. Some contracts settle every 1, 2, 4 or 8 hours, and payment occurs only when the position is open at the settlement timestamp.
Does 10x leverage multiply the 31 USDT cost by ten?
Not when notional remains fixed. Cost increases if higher leverage is used to increase notional exposure.
Why does funding already exceed fees at seven days?
Fees are a one-off round trip; funding repeats every interval. The all-taker 10 USDT happens once, while 1 USDT per interval at +0.01% repeats 21 times in a week. Funding overtakes the round trip somewhere around the tenth settlement.
Can I estimate a daily cost as total ÷ days?
Only roughly, and only while the rate is stable. It also spreads a one-off round trip across every day, which understates the daily cost of short holds. It is sounder to treat round-trip fees as an entry threshold and track daily funding separately.