Regulated U.S. prediction market exchanges commonly charge a trading fee that depends on the price: for taker orders it is rate × contracts × price × (1 − price), rounded up to the next cent, with a standard rate of 0.07. Enter an order to see the fee, the share of your cost it takes, and how it changes across prices. Other prediction markets set their own fees.
Fee = rate × contracts × price × (1 − price), rounded up to the next cent.
If you sell instead of holding to the end, the sale is charged too.
Fee on this order
$1.12
Rounding is per order, so splitting one buy into many small orders can cost more in total.
| Price | Cost | Fee | Fee as % of cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5¢ | $5.00 | $0.34 | 6.8% |
| 10¢ | $10.00 | $0.63 | 6.3% |
| 20¢ | $20.00 | $1.12 | 5.6% |
| 30¢ | $30.00 | $1.47 | 4.9% |
| 40¢ | $40.00 | $1.68 | 4.2% |
| 50¢ | $50.00 | $1.75 | 3.5% |
| 60¢ | $60.00 | $1.68 | 2.8% |
| 70¢ | $70.00 | $1.47 | 2.1% |
| 80¢ | $80.00 | $1.12 | 1.4% |
| 90¢ | $90.00 | $0.63 | 0.7% |
| 95¢ | $95.00 | $0.34 | 0.36% |
Fee = rate × contracts × P × (1 − P), with P the price in dollars, rounded up to the next cent for each order. At rate 0.07, 100 contracts at 20¢ pay 0.07 × 100 × 0.20 × 0.80, rounded up: $1.12. That is 5.6% of the $20.00 the contracts cost.
As a share of what you pay, the fee is roughly rate × (1 − P), so it climbs as the price falls. At 5¢, 100 contracts cost $5.00 and pay $0.34 in fees, 6.8% of the cost. A single 5¢ contract pays the minimum $0.01, which is 20% of its price, because of the rounding. Cheap contracts already tend to lose money (the favorite-longshot bias), and fees make it worse.
The fee is rounded up on each order, not on each contract. Buying 100 contracts in one order is cheaper than buying them one at a time: at 5¢, one order of 100 pays $0.34, while 100 single-contract orders pay $1.00.
A fee raises the probability a contract must win for you to break even. In the example above, 100 contracts at 20¢ need to win 21.12% of the time, not 20%. If you sell before the market settles, the sale is charged too, so trading in and out costs twice. Use the expected value calculator to see whether a trade still pays after fees.
Put it to work on live prices
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