Free calculator
A 2% gap is not $2. Price both fees and the rebalance first.
What the default example shows
Hypothetical inputs — not live or current market data
Net result before tax
$0.80
With these inputs a 2.00% gap is $2.00 gross, but $1.202 of fees and rebalancing leaves about $0.80. About $200.00 plus reserves has to be prefunded across both venues.
The percentage is measured against the buy amount only, not against the total prefunded balance. Coin value is priced at the buy ask.
Not included: price movement between the two orders, order-book depth and slippage beyond the fills you entered, failed or partial orders, funding or borrowing costs, taxes, account eligibility, and deposit or withdrawal availability. Any one of them can erase a small result.
Cross-exchange arbitrage buys a coin where the executable ask is lower and sells the same quantity where the executable bid is higher. The gap is gross revenue. Two trading fees and the cost of moving cash and coins back afterwards come out of it, and what is left is the result.
To fill both legs at nearly the same time you need cash already on the buy venue and the coin already on the sell venue. Buying first and then transferring the coin leaves the sell price exposed for the whole transfer. That is why a $100 buy needs about $200 prepared, plus reserves for fees and rebalancing, and why the percentage above is measured against the buy amount only.
Fill the calculator with numbers you have confirmed, in this order.
Both accounts are already funded for other reasons, every input above is confirmed rather than assumed, the net stays positive when you worsen both prices, and you can afford the result turning negative. A small test teaches the mechanics; it does not show what a typical result looks like.
Skip it if the buy amount is your whole budget, if any cost is a guess, if the net only works at the displayed last price, or if you cannot sell the second leg immediately. A result of a few cents is thinner than ordinary slippage.
For the full worked example and the reasoning behind it, read $100 crypto arbitrage: how much is left after fees.
Next step
Best forThe fee fields decide the result. Compare published base trading costs for the same order size on this site, then confirm the live fee and withdrawal terms on each exchange you are eligible to use.
Formula. Quantity = buy amount ÷ executable buy ask. Gross sale = quantity × executable sell bid. Net = gross sale − buy amount − buy fee − sell fee − transfer/rebalancing cost. The buy fee is a percent of the buy amount and the sell fee is a percent of the gross sale. Break-even sell bid = (buy amount + buy fee + rebalancing cost) ÷ (quantity × (1 − sell fee)).
Default example. $100 ÷ $1.00 = 100 coins. 100 × $1.02 = $102.00, a $2.00 gross difference. Buy fee $0.10, sell fee $0.102, rebalancing $1.00. Net = $0.798, shown as $0.80, which is 0.80% of the $100 buy amount. Break-even sell bid ≈ $1.0120.
Prefunding. The balance requirement is the buy amount in cash plus the same quantity of coins on the sell venue, valued at the buy ask, plus the fees and rebalancing cost as reserves. The percentage shown is against the buy amount, not this total.
Exclusions. Price movement, order-book depth and slippage beyond the fills you enter, failed or partial orders, funding and borrowing costs, taxes, account eligibility, and deposit or withdrawal availability are not modelled.
What this is not. The inputs are hypothetical. This page does not fetch prices or fees, does not scan for opportunities, and does not describe a trade anyone placed.
Background sources. BitMEX: Crypto Arbitrage—A Practical Guide on prefunding, simultaneous execution, fees and rebalancing, and Coinbase: What Is Crypto Arbitrage Trading? on arbitrage types and multiple trading fees. Neither supplies the numbers above.
Formula and default example checked .
Quantity is the buy amount divided by the executable buy ask. Gross sale is quantity times the executable sell bid. Net is gross sale minus the buy amount, the buy fee, the sell fee, and the transfer or rebalancing cost. In the default example that is $102.00 − $100.00 − $0.10 − $0.102 − $1.00 = $0.798, shown as $0.80.
Enough to pay both trading fees and the full rebalancing cost. With a $100 buy, 0.10% on each leg and a $1.00 rebalancing cost, the sell bid has to be about $1.0120 against a $1.00 ask, a gap of about 1.20%. A smaller gap loses money before any slippage.
A percentage trading fee shrinks with the trade, but a withdrawal or network fee usually does not. A flat $1.00 cost is 1% of a $100 buy, which is half of a 2% gap before either trading fee is paid.
Only if it survives a worse fill. In the default example the sell bid can fall about 0.78% before the result reaches zero, so one thin order book or a delayed second leg can remove it. Treat a tiny positive number as a reason to check depth and transfers, not as a signal to trade.
No. It does not fetch prices, fees or opportunities. Every number comes from the hypothetical inputs you type, so the result is only as accurate as the executable prices and costs you enter.