You set your stop-loss at the entry price, thinking you can exit at breakeven. Then you close the position and see your account is still losing money—because you forgot to include trading fees and funding fees.
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Core point: The breakeven point is not your entry price
A breakeven stop-loss trigger price must be higher than your entry cost for a long position, or lower than your entry cost for a short position. This "cost" includes three parts:
Opening fee: the fee you pay to the platform when entering a trade
Closing fee: another fee you pay when exiting the trade
Funding fee: settled every 8 hours while you hold a position, paid between longs and shorts
If your stop-loss price is exactly equal to your entry price, after the stop is triggered and the position is closed, your account will still be negative after deducting the two trading fees and any funding fees paid while holding. It is not breakeven.
Step 1: Calculate your real entry cost
[What to do]: Include trading fees in your exit price calculation to find the true breakeven point.
[How to do it]: Take a long BTC perpetual futures position as an example. Assume you open at 60,000 USDT, position value is 10,000 U, and leverage is 10x.
Check your platform's fee rate. For Binance Futures, for example: Taker fee is 0.04%, Maker fee is 0.02%.
Opening fee = position value × fee rate. If you open with a market order: 10,000 × 0.04% = 4 USDT.
This fee is not deducted from your margin. It is deducted directly from your "realized PnL" after opening. So the moment you enter, you already have a floating loss of -4 U.
[Done when]: You can calculate the exact opening fee amount and understand that you are already losing money at entry.
Step 2: Include the closing fee
[What to do]: When the stop-loss is triggered, closing the position will charge another fee. This also needs to be included in your stop-loss price in advance.
[How to do it]: If your stop-loss price is exactly 60,000, the system will charge another fee based on the position value at 60,000 when closing.
Closing fee = 60,000 × 0.04% = 24 USDT. This is because the position value is still 10,000 U, and the fee rate depends on how your order is filled.
Opening fee 4 U + closing fee 24 U = 28 U total trading fees. If the stop-loss is set at 60,000, after it is triggered the actual equivalent position value is 60,000 - 24 = 59,976, so your net loss is 28 U.
[Done when]: You can list the total of opening fee + closing fee and understand that the breakeven price is not the entry price.
Step 3: Include funding fees during the holding period
[What to do]: If your holding period crosses a funding settlement time, usually every 8 hours, you also need to add the funding fee cost.
[How to do it]: Funding fee = position value × funding rate.
Assume you hold for 8 hours and the funding rate at settlement is 0.01%. You are long, and when the funding rate is positive, longs pay shorts. Funding fee = 10,000 × 0.01% = 1 USDT.
If you hold for 24 hours, there are 3 settlements. Each settlement may have a different rate, so the total cost could be 3-5 U.
Add these three items together: opening fee + closing fee + funding fee = your total cost.
[Done when]: You can explain that funding fees are not collected by the exchange but are transferred between longs and shorts, and you know they also affect the breakeven point.
Step 4: Calculate the real breakeven stop-loss price
[What to do]: Convert the total cost into a price distance and set a stop-loss price that covers all costs.
[How to do it]:
Long: Breakeven stop-loss price = entry price + (opening fee + closing fee + funding fee) / position quantity
Short: Breakeven stop-loss price = entry price - (opening fee + closing fee + funding fee) / position quantity
Using the example above: total cost is about 30 U, position value is 10,000 U, so the cost as a percentage is about 0.3% (30/10000). Therefore, the real breakeven stop-loss price is about 60,180 for a long position, not 60,000.
If you set the stop-loss at 60,180, after it is triggered and the position is closed, you will roughly break even after all fees. If you set it at 60,000, you lose about 30 U for every 10,000 U position.
Risk note: Funding rates are not fixed. When market sentiment is extreme, such as when longs and shorts are severely unbalanced, the funding rate can spike to 0.05% or even higher. A single settlement can eat 0.05% of your position value. If you hold for a long time, cumulative funding costs may become higher than trading fees.
Step 5: Breakeven stop-loss strategies for different situations
Case A: Short-term quick trades, holding less than 8 hours
No funding fee is charged. Only calculate opening + closing fees. Breakeven stop-loss price is about entry price ± 0.05%-0.08%, depending on your platform's fee rate.
Case B: Holding overnight or longer
You must include funding fees. If the funding rate stays positive for a long time, longs pay shorts, so the longer you hold, the higher the cost. You can use a "dynamic breakeven" strategy: after each funding settlement, manually raise your stop-loss price to cover the new funding cost.
Case C: You are filled as a Maker
The fee rate is lower. For Binance, for example, the Maker fee of 0.02% is only half of the Taker fee. If you enter with a limit order, your opening fee is cut in half, and your breakeven stop-loss price can also be set lower.
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New user benefit: 20% off trading fees upon registration!！
FAQ
Q: If the funding rate is positive, do I always lose money? A: No. When the funding rate is positive, longs pay shorts. When it is negative, shorts pay longs. So if you are long and the funding rate is negative, meaning the market is strongly bearish, you may actually receive funding fees. But this situation does not last forever, so do not treat funding fees as a stable income source.
Q: Does the platform include trading fees in unrealized PnL? A: No. Unrealized PnL only reflects the price difference. Fees are deducted directly from realized PnL when the trade is executed. So after opening, your unrealized PnL may still show 0, but your realized PnL is already negative—that is the fee.
Q: After the stop-loss is triggered, will funding fees still be charged? A: No. Funding fees are only charged at fixed settlement times, usually 00:00, 08:00, and 16:00 UTC. If you close before settlement, no funding fee is charged for that period. So if settlement is only a few minutes away, you can wait until after settlement before setting your breakeven stop-loss, or include the settlement cost in advance.
