How many times can you open a Perptual Futures position without getting liquidated? I have summarized the answer through 10 years of blood and tears.

Question

A crypto friend just asked me: how many times leverage should be used for Perptual Futures? I asked him back - have you ever seen anyone go bankrupt because the leverage was too low? No. But have you seen anyone lose everything overnight because the leverage was out of control? Plenty.

The difference between Perptual Futures and futures is here: there is no delivery date. This is both freedom and a trap. You can hold positions indefinitely, enter and exit at any time, and renew infinitely. It sounds exhilarating, but the problem arises—unlimited time + unlimited leverage equals unlimited temptation.

I have seen too many people start cautiously, then go higher and higher. 5x → 10x → 30x → 50x, and finally wipe out to zero. They all say the same thing: “I was right about the direction, so why did I get liquidated?”

What is the truth? It's not that the direction was wrong, but that the margin was not kept with sufficient redundancy.

The Death Game of Leverage Multiples and Margin

Take BTC as an example:

30x leverage → Requires 16U margin
50x leverage → Requires 10U margin
100x leverage → requires 5U margin

With the same principal, the higher the leverage, the lower the margin requirement. It sounds cost-effective, but in reality, you are dancing on the edge of a knife — any drawdown of more than 5% can get you liquidated.

I asked that friend who opens 30-50x leverage: why not open 100x? He said, “It explodes too quickly.” I laughed, because as long as you use leverage, no matter how many times, you are on a time bomb, the difference is just the length of the fuse.

The real culprit of liquidation is not the high leverage, but three operational mistakes.

The first mistake: Full position. Can I use isolated margin? Yes. But many people are greedy, going all in at once, and when the market moves against them, they don't even have a chance to react.

The second mistake: not setting a stop loss. This is the most fatal. I have seen how many people say “If I hold on, I can break even,” but in the end, the deeper they hold on, the worse it gets. Holding on to a position is not confidence; it's gambling on luck.

The third mistake: Insufficient margin. Normal market fluctuations (3%-8% are quite common) require that your margin can handle them. Trying to leverage a few hundred coins to control tens of thousands, and then getting liquidated from a single fluctuation, you will find - you were right, but ended up with nothing. This is even more frustrating than losing money.

The Iron Rule of Perpetual Futures

Use isolated margin, never use full margin → Single loss is controllable

Stop loss must be set → The margin that can withstand a 5%-10% pullback is the bottom line.

Set a smaller goal → With a principal of 5000U, earn 50-100U daily, relying on compounding, it can double in 12 months, which is much more realistic than dreaming of financial freedom with a one-time all-in.

The Last Truth

A 100x position that can control losses is safer than a 5x position with no stop loss.

Because the former is systematic and disciplined, while the latter is gambling. Leverage itself is not wrong; it is our attitude towards leverage that is mistaken. Perptual Futures are never won by gambling, but by a system. Those traders who survive in the end are not because of good luck, but because they can afford to lose.