What Is Slippage and How Does It Affect Arbitrage Profitability?

Slippage is the difference between the expected price of a trade and the price at which the trade is executed. High slippage, often due to low liquidity or a large trade size, reduces the profit margin for arbitrageurs.

If the potential profit from arbitrage is less than the combined cost of slippage and gas fees, the arbitrage incentive disappears, and the peg-restoration mechanism stalls.

What Is the Impact of a Market Halt on a Continuous TWAP Calculation?
How Do Exchanges Use Circuit Breakers to Halt Trading during Extreme Liquidation Events?
What Is the Difference between a Hard Peg and a Soft Peg in Currency?
Define ‘Arbitrage’ in the Context of Stablecoin Peg Maintenance
How Does Transaction Latency Affect the Profitability of High-Frequency Spot-Futures Arbitrage?
Does Slippage Affect the Profitability of an Arbitrage Trade?
How Does the ‘Burning’ and ‘Minting’ Mechanism Help a Stablecoin Maintain Its Peg?
How Does Slippage in Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs) Impact Arbitrage Effectiveness?

Glossar

Arbitrage

Exploitation ⎊ Arbitrage, within cryptocurrency, options, and derivatives, represents the simultaneous purchase and sale of an asset in different markets to capitalize on transient price discrepancies, effectively a risk-free profit opportunity.

Profit Margin

Yield ⎊ Profit margin within cryptocurrency, options, and derivatives contexts represents the net profit realized as a percentage of the invested capital, factoring in transaction costs and risk-adjusted returns.

Concentrated Liquidity Pools

Allocation ⎊ Concentrated Liquidity Pools represent a capital deployment strategy within automated market makers, shifting from uniform distribution to customized ranges, thereby enhancing capital efficiency.

Sandwich Attack

Attack ⎊ Sandwich Attack is a specific form of front running where an attacker executes a buy order immediately before a victim's large intended buy order and then executes a sell order immediately after, effectively sandwiching the victim's transaction between two profitable trades for the attacker.

Low Liquidity

Impedance ⎊ Low liquidity within cryptocurrency, options, and derivatives markets signifies a diminished capacity of market participants to execute substantial trade volumes without causing significant price impact.

Arbitrage Incentive

Mechanism ⎊ Arbitrage incentive, within cryptocurrency, options, and derivatives, represents the profit potential arising from temporary price discrepancies across different markets or exchanges for the same asset or equivalent derivative contract.