Crypto Perpetual futures, or also known as perps, are a type of crypto derivative. Instead of buying or selling crypto directly, you trade contracts that track the price of crypto.

Unlike traditional futures, perpetual futures do not expire. This gives you flexibility to hold a position as long as you meet the margin requirements.

When you hold a long position, you can profit when the price of the crypto goes up. And holding a short position can be profitable when the price goes down. However, if the market moves against your position, you can incur losses. Profits and losses (P&L) are settled every 15 minutes through settlement payments. This includes both unrealized and realized P&L. Realized P&L includes trading fees accumulated on a position since the last periodic settlement and P&L from partial position closures during the settlement window. P&L becomes realized after a position is closed.

With perpetual futures, you have the option to use leverage. This means you can open a larger position with less money upfront. While leverage can increase your potential profits, it can also increase your risk of losses.

Perpetual futures offer many benefits but also come with significant risks, especially when using leverage.

Benefits

• Trade on rising and falling prices: Open long and short positions based on how you view the market.
• No expiry: Positions can stay open as long as you meet margin requirements. Unlike traditional futures, you don’t need to roll contracts over.
• Leverage: Hold larger positions with less money upfront.
• Hedge your portfolio: This means you can manage risk on your spot crypto holding without selling them. For example, if the market is falling, a trader can ‘hedge’ those losses by opening a short position to profit on the falling price. This offsets the losses from spot crypto holdings.
• More trading hours: Perpetuals can be traded 24 hours a day, 7 days a week including holidays.
• Funding rate opportunities: If you hold a position during a funding window (which occurs every 8 hours) you may receive or pay a funding rate depending on the current market conditions.
• You don’t need to own the underlying crypto: Perpetuals give you exposure to the crypto price movements without holding the underlying asset.

Risks

• Liquidation: If your margin drops below the required margin level, your position may be partially or fully liquidated. This means you could lose some or all of the margin you posted.
• Increased risk of losses: Using leverage increases the size of your positions, which amplifies potential losses too.
• Price difference: During periods of high market volatility or low liquidity, the price of a perpetual contract may deviate from the spot price.
• Active position management required: Since perpetuals don’t have an expiry, it’s your responsibility to continually monitor the health and margin levels of your open positions.

Robinhood provides tools like margin health indicators, risk alerts, and optional take profit and stop loss orders to help you manage risk. But it’s important you understand how perpetuals work, how leverage can impact your potential profits and losses, and how to effectively use the risk management tools before you trade perpetuals.

In rare cases, trading may be temporarily paused to maintain system integrity, like during major market events or if technical issues arise at our partner venue that executes the trades.

To trade perpetual futures on Robinhood, you must complete an onboarding process. This includes:

• An appropriateness assessment: Assess your financial background and whether you understand the risks involved with trading perpetuals and using leverage.

You will answer questions about your investing experience, income, investment goals, and knowledge of trading. If you pass, you can trade perpetuals as soon as trading is available. If you fail the test, you will be directed to additional learning materials and given another chance after the cooldown period.

The cooldown periods after a failed attempt are:

• 24 hours after the first time
• 48 hours after the second time
• 72 hours after the third time
• After the third failed attempt, you must wait for 2 weeks since the first time you took the test. After the 2 week cooldown, the periods start over.

You are required to learn more about trading perpetuals by reading An introduction to perpetual futures in the app before you can reapply. We suggest you take the opportunity to find additional resources during the cooldown periods to learn all about perpetual futures.

Details about each contract can be found on the contract’s detail page. Tap the info icon (i) for information about each metric in the app including:

• Bid price x size: The highest price a trader is willing to pay for the contract and how many contracts are available at that price. A high bid with large size can signal strong buying interest or support around that price.
• Ask price x size: The lowest price a trader is willing to sell the contract for and how many contracts are being offered at that price. A low ask with large ask size may signal strong selling interest or resistance at a certain price.
• Last traded price: The price of the most recent trade for the contract. It reflects recent market activity and shows how prices are moving in real time.
• 24h change: The difference between the last traded price and 24 hours ago, shown in both value and percentage. A large 24h change may reflect strong buying or selling activity over the past day.
• Mark price: The current estimated value of a contract, based on the index price and recent market activity. Take profit orders, stop loss orders and liquidations are triggered by the mark price.
• Index price: The average price of the underlying asset across major spot markets. It’s used to calculate the mark price and keep contract prices aligned with the broader market.
• Funding rate: A periodic payment between long and short traders that helps keep the contract price in line with the underlying asset. A positive rate means long positions pay shorts; a negative rate means shorts pay longs.
• Next funding countdown: The time remaining until the next funding rate payment is applied to open positions.
• Open interest: The total number of open contracts in the market. Higher open interest may reflect growing interest or expectations around price movements of the underlying asset, while lower interest may reflect less interest.
• 24h volume: The total notional value of all contracts traded in the past 24 hours. Higher volume may indicate increased trading activity or stronger interest in short-term price movements, while lower volume may suggest less trading activity.
• 24h high: The highest last traded price in the past 24 hours.
• 24h low: The lowest last traded price in the past 24 hours.

When trading perpetual futures, it is important to know the difference between a position and an order.

An order is an instruction to open, modify, or close a position. You can place different types of orders, like market or limit.

A position is the actual exposure you have in the market after an order is filled.

• Positions update in real time as the market moves
• Go long if you think the asset price will increase or go short if you think it will decrease
• Positions can stay open as long as you have enough margin to support your position

When trading perpetual futures on Robinhood, you must maintain a certain amount of margin to open and maintain your positions.

Initial margin

The amount of margin required to open a position. If your margin falls beneath its initial margin floor (20% of the position’s notional value at each settlement), exposure-increasing orders for the position are canceled.

Maintenance margin

The minimum amount of margin required to keep your position open. It is calculated as 10% of the position’s notional value. If your margin falls below this level, your position may be partially liquidated.

Close-out margin

If your margin falls below 5% of your position’s notional value, the position may be fully liquidated.

Liquidation fees

If your position is liquidated, the following fees may apply:

• Partial liquidation: 0.05% of the notional value liquidated
• Full liquidation: 1% of the total notional value

These fees are charged by our partner venue.

Leverage limits

Robinhood currently offers up to 3x leverage for eligible traders. This helps reduce risk and aligns with regulatory guidelines.

Margin available is the amount of margin you can use to:

• Open new perpetual futures positions
• Increase margin on open positions
• Avoid liquidation by maintaining the required margin

The value updates in real time as your trades, P&L, and funding payments change. If losses and fees are covered by EUR margin, it will be converted to USD at settlement without fees.

Robinhood supports EUR and USD as margin. You can find a breakdown of how much EUR and USD margin you have posted to a position when placing on order. Here’s how to tell if EUR or USD margin will be used:

• EUR from your Robinhood buying power serves as margin in these scenarios:
  • If you open new isolated positions
  • If you open new cross margin positions without existing cross margin positions
• USD serves as margin in these scenarios:
  • If you generate PNL on a live perpetual position, it will settle into your margin balance at the 15-minute periodic settlement

Unlike traditional futures contracts, perpetual futures on Robinhood technically don’t have an expiry date. That’s what makes them perpetual. However, settlements occur every 15 minutes where fees, and profits and losses are settled. Perpetual futures are designed to let you hold a long or short position indefinitely, as long as you meet the margin requirements.

• There is no expiration date like with standard futures contracts.
• You do not have to worry about rolling your position over.
• You can choose to close your position at any time.

You may be restricted from trading perpetuals if:

• You fail the onboarding assessment
• You live in a restricted region
• You have a position being liquidated
• System-wide limits or restrictions are required

Perpetual futures markets on Robinhood are open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week—including weekends and holidays. You can open, modify, and close positions at any time.

If you close a position with a profit or loss, you may be subject to taxes in compliance with your local laws.

Robinhood can help by:

• Tracking your trade history
• Calculating realized P&L
• Providing account statements or transaction history that may be required for tax reporting under EU regulations (MiFID II/MiCA)

Robinhood Europe, UAB (“RHEU”) (company code: 306377915) is authorized and regulated by the Bank of Lithuania (“BoL”) as a financial brokerage firm and a crypto-asset service provider. RHEU’s registered address is: Mėsinių 5, LT-01133 Vilnius, Lithuania; address for correspondence: Konstitucijos pr, 21A (QUADRUM East), LT-08130, Vilnius, Lithuania; website.