Arcus Points Lab

Independent research tool

POINTS ESTIMATOR

How many Arcus points
could you earn?

Arcus hands out points to its traders every week. Tell us roughly how you would trade and we will estimate your points, and what it may cost you to earn them.

Pick a market
Choose what you would trade: crypto like BTC or ETH, or a stock or gold.
Describe your week
How much money you keep on Arcus, how big your trades are, and how long you hold them.
Read your estimate
See roughly how many points you could earn, and what it might cost you in fees.

Treat every number as a rough guess. Arcus has not published how points are counted. This tool uses real market prices and a best-guess scoring recipe built from a handful of real accounts. It cannot promise what you will earn, and points have no confirmed cash value.

New to this? Plain-English glossary 9 terms

Points: Arcus’s reward for using the exchange. 250,000 are shared among all traders each week. Arcus has not said what they will be worth.
Collateral: The money you deposit on Arcus. In our data it earned points only while it backed an open position; money left idle earned nothing.
Leverage: A multiplier on your trade size. At 3×, $100 of your money controls a $300 trade. Bigger trades mean bigger gains and bigger losses.
Open interest (OI): The total size of all open trades in a market. Big markets have a lot; small ones have less.
Spread: The small gap between the buying price and the selling price. You pay it every time you trade.
Funding: A small hourly payment between traders who bet up and traders who bet down. Depending on the market, you either pay it or receive it.
Basis points (bps): A tiny percentage. 1 bps is 0.01%, so 2.25 bps is 0.0225%.
RWA: Real-world assets: stocks, gold and index funds you can trade on Arcus. Arcus says these earn a points boost.
Market order vs limit order: A market order trades immediately at the best available price and pays the higher “taker” fee. A limit order waits for your price and usually pays less. Arcus has not said that either earns more points.

Your week on Arcus

Four answers are enough. Everything else has a sensible default.

STEP 1 OF 2

Which market would you trade? Prices and open interest load live from Arcus

Money you keep on ArcusYour deposit, assumed to stay all week

USD

Leverage3× turns $100 into a $300 trade. Higher is riskier

How long you hold each tradeFrom opening to closing

hours

Trades this weekOne trade = open it, then close it

trades

$300 position · $1,800 weekly volume · 24 position-hours

Fees, direction and timing optional

Days your money stays deposited

of 7 days

Trade direction Long bets the price rises; short bets it falls Share of stock or gold trading done outside US market hoursOnly matters for stock and gold markets

Trading feeArcus’s standard fee for taking an order is 2.25 bps. Lower if you use limit orders or trade a lot

bps

Extra price slipOn top of the live spread, because prices move while you trade

bps

The spread comes from Arcus’s live order book. Funding uses the current hourly rate, held constant, so real payments will differ.

How points are counted (our best fit) advanced

Arcus counts several things but has not said how much each matters. We tested these weights against four real accounts over four reward weeks: with a ×1.5 stock boost they describe all sixteen weekly results within about 1.2× typically (worst 1.4×). The other presets are alternatives the data cannot rule out.

Weight on money at workYour balance, counted only while a position of at least $10 is open

Weight on share of the marketPosition × hours ÷ the market’s size. Small markets score higher

Stock and gold boostArcus confirms a boost exists; ×1.5 fits our data best

After-hours extra boostExtra boost for the outside-hours share. Left at ×1: our data cannot tell when the stock boost applies

Round trips get the remaining 5%. These are fitted to four accounts over three weeks, not Arcus’s real shares of the 250K weekly pool.

Calibration and referrals advanced

Our estimate compares your plan with a reference account: the average of sixteen weekly results from four real accounts, measured from Arcus’s public data and matched with their weekly points. That account kept about $590 at work for a full week and completed about 9 round trips, and in the latest reward week (paid 28 October) it would have earned about 2.6 points in a crypto market. The first week paid about 1.6× more for the same activity, and the level can move again as more people join.

Points of the reference accountLatest reward week

pts

Its money at workBalance × days while a position was open

$-days

Its round trips per weekAverage of sixteen account-weeks

trades

Its market-share score(position $-hours ÷ market OI)^0.75

Points earned by friends you referred

pts

Share of those points you receiveUnknown, separate from referral cash

STEP 2 · YOUR ESTIMATE FOR ONE WEEKROUGH GUESS

Estimated points

—

Calculating…

Where do these points come from?

If Arcus weighs things differently

The range covers three descriptions our data cannot tell apart. It does not cover changes in the overall level from week to week: the first week paid about 1.6× more for the same activity than the latest. It is not a promise: your real points could be lower, higher or zero.

What it could cost you

ONE WEEK

—

Costs need a live price spread and funding rate.

This counts fees, spread, slippage and funding only. It does not include money lost if prices move against you, which is the biggest risk. Negative funding means you would receive money, which is not guaranteed.

OPTIONAL · COMPARE MARKETS

Same week, different markets.

See how your plan scores in each market, next to its cost and size. This is a comparison, not advice to trade.

DATED SNAPSHOT15 October 2026 · current OI is not reward-week OI

Your plan compared across markets
Market	Est. points	Market size (OI)	Spread / depth	Boost	Warnings	Choose
Loading available markets…

With the best-fit weights the size of a market does not change your points; small markets only score higher under the “Rewards small markets” preset, and stocks and gold only because of the assumed boost. “Most points first (cautious)” ranks by the low end of the range. By default we hide markets under $250K of open trades or $100K of daily volume. Prices older than 60 seconds are dropped. “Depth” is only the very best price on each side. Whether a market earns a boost for you is up to Arcus.

Claims you may have seen, checked against real accounts 7 claims

Based on four accounts whose full histories we measured from Arcus’s public data over four reward weeks. Three is few, so “not supported” means the data disagrees with the claim, not that it is proven false.

“Keeping money on Arcus earns points”Only while you hold a position

Money left idle earned nothing: in week 3 two accounts that only kept money on Arcus earned 0.01 and 0 points. But the balance behind open positions explains points better than anything else we measured, including position size. A $3,000 balance backing positions all week earned about 200× more than $200 that was mostly idle.

“Bigger positions earn more”Unclear

Once the balance behind open positions is counted, position size adds little: it got 0% through week 3 and about 10% once week 4 was added. We cannot yet tell whether a tiny position would count the same, because every account we measured held real positions.

“More orders earn more points”Weak at most

Completed round trips add a small amount (5% of the best fit). Order count by itself, which seemed to matter with three small accounts, did not hold up once a large account was added.

“Positions in small markets earn more”Weakening

One large account earned about 5× more after moving from big index markets to a small one (META), but in week 4 it moved mostly to big markets (NVDA, AAPL) and earned the same. Another account’s small-market positions did not pay off. The best fit gives it 0%; the “Rewards small markets” preset shows what it would mean.

“Only trading volume counts”Not supported

One account traded $207,000 in week 1 and earned less than one that traded $16,000. Volume adds nothing once the balance behind positions is counted.

“Market orders (or limit orders) earn extra because of fees”Not supported

Fees differed up to 50× between accounts with similar points, and neither fees nor market-order or limit-order volume improved the fit.

“Stocks and gold (RWA) get a 5× boost”About ×1.5, not ×5

Arcus says a boost exists, not how big. Fitted with four weeks of data, holding in stocks, gold and index markets earns about 1.5× as much as crypto; ×5 fits clearly worse. Most of our stock data comes from one account, and we cannot tell whether the boost applies at all hours or mainly outside US market hours.

How the estimate works and what we do not know

Money at work, plus round trips

Money-at-work score = your balance × days kept × the share of the week a position worth at least $10 was open, compared with a reference account built from sixteen measured weekly results. Round-trips score = trades opened and closed, compared the same way. A third score, your position × hours as a share of the market’s size, gets weight only in the “Rewards small markets” preset. Holding in stocks, gold and index markets counts about 1.5× (fitted); an extra after-hours boost is left at ×1.

Weekly points = 2.6 × the weighted scores + any referral credit. The best fit is 95% money at work and 5% round trips with a ×1.5 stock boost, which describes all sixteen account-weeks within about 1.2× typically and 1.4× at worst when each week has its own overall level. That is looser than our earlier fits to three small accounts, because a large account showed those fits were too simple.

What our sample can and cannot tell us

Four accounts over four weeks, from $35 to about $3,000 on Arcus. In week 4 the model, written down before the points came in, predicted two active accounts within 1.2× and two idle ones at exactly 0. Idle money earned nothing, and the balance behind open positions matters more than position size, trading volume, fees or order type. We have not seen anyone hold a tiny position against a large balance, so we cannot say whether that would count in full.

The form was found by searching many combinations, so it is the best description so far, not Arcus’s formula. Still missing: more accounts of different sizes and markets, the size of the stock and after-hours boosts, and whether small markets really pay more.

Official points announcement ↗ · Market data definitions ↗ · Spread data ↗

Previous volume-only model & network research Advanced comparison

VOLUME-ONLY COMPARISON

Network volume model

This separate model assumes a proportional share of a hypothetical pool.

DATED SNAPSHOTChecked 29 Oct 2026 · rounded published figures · not liveDefiLlama ↗

PERP VOLUME · 24H ↗

$335.1M

PERP VOLUME · 7D ▥

$2.169B

WEEKLY POINTS POOL ✧

250K

PROGRAM ENDS BY ◷

H1 2027

A model, with the assumptions in plain sight. Arcus weighs trading quality, market making, retained deposits and referrals. Volume alone cannot predict official points. Token allocation and conversion are unconfirmed.

How it works ↗

Build your trading scenario

Enter daily or weekly volume, with room for the unknowns.

MODEL INPUTS

Volume period

Your weekly trading volumeUSD notional · both entry and exit count

$/ week

$142,857.14 average per day · points are distributed weekly.

Trading horizon Weeks of new activity

weeks

Points you already hold Optional · excludes hidden points

pts

VOLUME SCORING ASSUMPTION 50%

Share of the weekly pool attributed to perp volume

0% · other activity100% · volume only

This split is an assumption. Arcus has not published category weights.

Trading costs basis points · 1 bp = 0.01%

Effective trading fee

bps

Slippage + spread

bps

Net weekly funding Negative = income

Other total costs Include losses / hedging costs

Fee defaults are illustrative, not Arcus’s fee schedule. Enter your actual blended rates. Capital deposited is not a cost unless lost or spent.

Competition & scoring edit assumptions

Other weekly perp volume Rolling 7d proxy · excludes your modeled volume

Network volume growth

% / week

Relative scoring factor Assumed advantage vs average trader

Weekly total points 250K official · edits are hypothetical

pts

No published RWA or overnight boost multiplier exists. The relative scoring factor is a sensitivity input, not an official multiplier.

ESTIMATED POINTSESTIMATE

691.2

691.2 new + 0 existing · 12 weeks · default example

Estimated first week57.6 pts

Modeled volume score share

New activity cost / point$5.21

Your actual allocation can be lower, higher, or zero.

Modeled reward value

↗

$11,766

Total modeled value · including existing points

New activity costs$3,600

Net from new activity+$8,166

Explore valuation assumptions →

$1B FDV · 20% allocation · 11.75M eligible points. Default assumptions, all hypothetical.

✧

The denominator is the difference. More competing volume means fewer points. More total program points means less value per point.

One volume. Three scoring assumptions.

See how uncertain weights change the estimate. Other inputs stay the same.

SENSITIVITY, NOT CONFIDENCE INTERVALS

Separate markets, separate denominators.

The estimator above uses perpetual volume only.

Valuation currently uses the previous volume model. Use “See what these points could be worth” on the Trading page to transfer its points and costs.

PRICE THE POSSIBILITIES

Valuation scenarios

Allocation × fully diluted valuation, divided by all eligible points.

All Arcus token inputs below are hypothetical. No token redemption, FDV, season allocation, or final points denominator is confirmed in the cited points announcement.

What is known so far (29 October 2026). Four weekly Season 1 distributions have issued 1,000,000 points to about 18,000 ranked accounts. At 250K a week the program can issue at most 35 more distributions (to 30 June 2027), so Season 1 tops out at 9.75M points if it runs the full length. Season 0 points are still hidden: our default of 2M is an assumption, and community estimates use 3.25M (13 weeks at 250K). For comparison, Lighter’s 25% allocation over 12.5M points is worth about $56-60 per point at its late-October FDV of roughly $2.8-3.0B.

Valuation assumptions

HYPOTHETICAL

The program ends no later than 30 June 2027; the exact final distribution count is not confirmed. Include Season 0 only if your assumed allocation covers it. FDV uses total supply, not circulating market cap.

IMPLIED POINT VALUE

$17.02

per eligible point · modeled

Total eligible points: 11,750,000 pts
Points reward pool value: $200M
Your unlocked value: $11,766
New activity break-even FDV: $305.97M

FDV × allocation ÷ total points

Explore the valuation map

Each cell is USD per point. Your modeled denominator is used throughout.

Scenario grid, not a price forecast. Net values exclude pre-existing points and subtract the costs of your new activity.

Competition compounds

Projected cumulative points versus a flat-volume network.

Your growth assumptionFlat network volume

LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

Protocol research

Compare six programs, modeled point values, and dated OTC references.

RESEARCH CHECKED · 06 OCT 2026

Comparison FDV assumption

One hypothetical FDV for every protocol. These are not launch prices or current valuations.

Protocol	Relevant allocation	Distribution / units	Implied $ / point	OTC reference
V Variational OmniVAR · Points live · Q4 2026 TGE planned (no date as of 29 Oct)	32%Announced genesis points pool	150K / week + 3M retroactiveFinal eligible denominator unconfirmed	UnavailableFinal points denominator unconfirmed	$37.50 / pointBroker report · mirroredPublication date unverified ·
≈ HyperliquidHYPE · Historical · 2024	31%Genesis allocation	1M → 700K / weekFinal eligible point denominator not verified	UnavailableNo verified universal conversion	Just above $6 / pointHistorical · secondary reportOct 2024 report ·
↗ LighterLIT · Historical · 2025	25%Seasons 1 + 2	250K / week in S212.5M points · official announcement	$20.00Aggregate implied average · assumed FDV	$33 / pointHistorical · secondary report16 Sep 2025 report ·
✳ ParadexDIME · Announced allocation	20%Announced XP airdrop	4M / week in S3Final airdrop XP denominator not verified	UnavailableNo verified universal conversion	~$0.80 / XPHistorical · low-confidence claim8 Dec 2025 report ·
✦ AsterASTER · Historical TGE pool	8.8%TGE pool · 53.5% long term	Rh / Au / GemsMultiple units; no universal point rate	UnavailableNo verified universal conversion	UnavailableNo verified matching-unit quote
dY dYdXDYDX · Historical · 2021	7.5%2021 retroactive mining	5 historical usage tiersNot a points-based conversion	UnavailableNo verified universal conversion	UnavailableToken tiers, not common points

“Unavailable” means a final eligible denominator or common unit is unverified. A larger headline community allocation may span multiple future programs.

Build a protocol valuation scenario

Use the comparison FDV above. Supply a denominator where the historical conversion is unverified.

ASSUMPTION SANDBOX

Reference distribution

Modeled allocation

Total eligible points / units Must match the allocation scope

IMPLIED VALUE / MODELED UNIT$32.00

32% is the announced genesis points allocation. 10M eligible points is an illustrative assumption, not an official total. The separate 18% ecosystem reserve is excluded.

Compare with an OTC reference

Use the selected protocol and denominator above. This is a paper comparison.

NO LIVE ORDER BOOK

Broker report · mirrored. Publication date and settlement unverified; observed 6 Oct 2026. No live executable quote is established. See OTC research notes below.

OTC reference price USD per point / unit · editable

Your point quantity For this protocol and reward scope

pts / units

Assumed broker / settlement fee 0 is illustrative, not a verified fee

Assumed execution haircut Discount the reference before fees

Total acquisition cost Optional · fees, funding, losses, net of income

OTC-implied FDV—

Reference vs modeled value—

Reference after fee / haircut—

Your acquisition cost / point—

Gross paper position at reference—

Paper position after fee / haircut—

Paper value less acquisition cost—

OTC-implied FDV = reference price × assumed final points ÷ allocation. A bid, ask, reported trade and token payout have different meanings. Quotes do not establish transferability, available size or successful settlement. Fees and haircut do not remove counterparty risk.

OTC research notes

Dated reports and attributed claims; none is a live executable quote.

CHECKED · 06 OCT 2026

Protocol	Reported reference	Report date / quality	Evidence & limitations
Variational Omni	$37.50 / point	Publication date unverifiedBroker report · mirrored	Observed in a mirror on 6 Oct 2026. Operator-reported purchases; settlement and original post date unverified. Current bid/ask not verified. Variational broker report (mirror) ↗
Hyperliquid	Just above $6 / point	Oct 2024 reportHistorical · secondary report	Published 15 Oct, updated 24 Oct 2024. No exact price or executable quote; no numeric default is loaded. Historical Hyperliquid points market ↗
Lighter	$33 / point	16 Sep 2025 reportHistorical · secondary report	Reported before TGE. Settlement not independently verified. This observation must not be treated as a current LIT points price. Historical Lighter OTC report ↗
Paradex	~$0.80 / XP	8 Dec 2025 reportHistorical · low-confidence claim	Blog claim about OTC groups; exact XP season and execution terms unverified. No current executable quote established. Historical Paradex OTC claim ↗

Use the allocation for the exact season and reward type being modeled.

Tokenomics ↗Trade to earn Rh ↗

dYdX

HISTORICAL · 2021

HOW DISTRIBUTION WORKED

Snapshot of historical usage assigned five tiers. Users then had to reach a perpetual-trading milestone in Epoch 0 to unlock their allocation.

VALUING THE POINTS

7.5% (75M DYDX) was allocated to retroactive mining. Rewards were tiered tokens and milestone-based, so a dollar-per-point number is not applicable.

A token allocation and a volume incentive do not automatically imply a linear points formula.

Retroactive Mining ↗

What did your points actually cost?

Personal cost basis works across programs, even when the official score is opaque.

Total acquisition costs ($)

Actual points received

pts

YOUR OBSERVED COST / POINT$5.00

Include fees, spread, slippage, net funding, hedging and realized losses. Negative total costs mean net income. No universal historical cost per point exists.

Points estimator v0.7

Points are estimated mainly from money at work: your balance × days, counted only while a position of at least $10 is open, with a small part (5%) for completed round trips, and holding in stock, gold and index markets counting about 1.5× (fitted to the data, not assumed). Idle money, trading volume, fees, order type and order count add nothing in our data. Fitted to four accounts from $35 to about $3,000 over four reward weeks, the model describes all sixteen weekly results within about 1.2× typically and 1.4× at worst when each week has its own overall level, and its week-4 predictions, written before the points came in, held for all four accounts. The form was found by searching many combinations, so it is the best description so far, not an official formula. A platform-level check suggests some points in week 2 went to activity the model does not see (spot, market making or referrals). The range covers three descriptions the data cannot tell apart, not week-to-week level changes. Live Arcus quotes supply spreads and book depth; missing or stale quotes never become zero costs.

Explore the planner and its full methodology →

OPEN THE BLACK BOX

Methodology & sources

Every formula, every limitation, and the sources behind the numbers.

How points are modeled

Daily volume assumes activity on all seven days and is multiplied by seven before calculating weekly points and trading costs. Switching the input period preserves the same modeled activity. The trading horizon, network volume and points pool remain weekly.

The rolling 7-day DefiLlama perpetual volume is a proxy for competing weekly activity. It is not Arcus’s exact rewards epoch or a weighted scoring denominator.

Weekly points = pool × volume category share × (your volume × relative factor) / (other volume + your volume × relative factor)

The model adds your activity to the competing-volume denominator. A 1× factor treats your activity like the average participant. This is an illustrative linear model; the official system may be nonlinear.

Network volume grows by your weekly growth assumption. Weekly estimates are added over your trading horizon. Existing points are added for total valuation, but excluded when measuring the profitability of new activity.

How value and costs are modeled

Total points = weekly pool × total program weeks + hidden / other eligible points

Value per point = FDV × allocation % / total points

New activity cost = total notional × (fee bps + slippage bps) / 10,000 + weekly net funding × weeks + other total costs.

Net new activity value = newly earned points × value per point − new activity costs. Break-even FDV solves that net value for zero. All rewards are conditional on your token-conversion assumption.

What Arcus actually confirms

CONFIRMED

250,000 points distributed weekly, Wednesdays at 3pm Eastern Time.
Trading quality, market making, retained collateral and referrals matter.
RWA activity and qualifying RWA perps outside 4am–8pm ET on US trading days receive boosts.
Robinhood Wallet spot routes can receive a spot boost; this does not alter the spot/perps pool split.
Season 0 totals are hidden; the program ends by H1 2027.

NOT PUBLISHED IN THE POINTS ANNOUNCEMENT

The score formula and allocation among categories.
Numeric RWA, overnight, deposit or referral multipliers.
A guaranteed points-to-token conversion or token value.
A token allocation for these points and the final eligible denominator.
A final season-week count or Season 0 point total.

Wash trading, self-matching, clustering, rapid churning and gaming may receive fewer or no points. This calculator does not model strategies to evade those rules.

Source library

Official program sources, market-data snapshots, and clearly labeled OTC reports.

Arcus · Introducing Arcus Points ↗OFFICIAL RULES

Rechecked 29 Oct 2026, unchanged: fixed 250K weekly pool; Wednesday 3pm ET; Season 0 totals hidden; program ends by H1 2027. Scoring, boost sizes, token conversion and allocation are not published here.

Source checked 2026-10-29 · read source for subsequent updates

DefiLlama · Arcus ↗VOLUME SNAPSHOT

Rounded public-page snapshot checked 29 Oct 2026: perps $335.1M / $2.169B; spot $1.91M / $12.13M; aggregator $2.70M / $16.22M (24h / 7d). Perps volume has fallen for three weeks while TVL and open interest grew. Observation time is recorded separately; exact metric cutoff is unknown.

Source checked 2026-10-29 · read source for subsequent updates

DefiLlama · API documentation ↗DATA ACCESS

Derivatives overview and summary are listed as paid API endpoints. Public endpoint verification returned HTTP 402 on 6 Oct 2026. This app ships without a paid API key.