Battle Formats
Battle Trade has several formats. Each is the same core game (open positions, trade live prices, highest portfolio wins) — they differ in opponent count, length, and what counts toward your Trader Score and rank.
Peer-Pot Battles (real stakes)
The headline format: two traders (or N in a bracket) each stake a pot in USDC, both trade real money on their own venue accounts, and the higher % return takes the pot. The stake is held in an on-chain escrow contract (Battle Trade never custodies it) and auto-pays the winner when the window closes, minus a small rake. You keep your own trading balance and its PnL; only the escrowed pot crosses between players.
- Increasing-leverage rounds.Each round enforces a higher minimum leverage (e.g. 20x → 50x → 100x). You can always go higher, never below the round’s floor — the stakes climb every round. At each round’s end all open positions are flattened so risk can’t compound across the match.
- One sabotage per game. Each player gets a single shot, used once: force-close (flatten your opponent’s open positions) or no-leverage (cap them at 1x for 3 minutes). Symmetric, bounded, opt-in.
- Friend-challenge first.Create a battle, get a share link, send it (“I bet you $100 I out-trade you”) — your friend joins by staking the same amount. No liquidity or matchmaking needed to start.
- Free practice is the ramp.Every peer-pot format also runs in paper mode with a fake balance and no wallet — the same UI, no real money. Learn there first, then stake when you’re ready.
Best for: settling a bet with a friend, proving your edge with real money on the line.
Practice (90s)
Solo round against 3 bots. Default PLAY NOW destination. 90 seconds, $10K starting balance, no entry fee. Counts toward XP and your win-rate but not toward Trader Score (no humans = no skill signal).
Best for: first-ever battle, testing a new strategy, daily streak.
Bot Arena
Pick from a roster of AI fighters and watch them trade for you. Spectator-first format — you’re the picker, not the trader. Same 4-player elimination structure but the agents do the work. /agents is the entry point.
Multiplayer Lobbies (2–8 players)
Public or invite-only. Auto-fires when min players is reached, or the host drops the round manually. Configurable round duration (60s–15min), starting balance, leverage cap, sabotage on/off. Most rounds are 5-minute Standard or 2-minute Blitz.
Tournaments & Brackets
Multi-round elimination. Round 1 plays out, bottom 25% drops, survivors advance. Sponsored events sometimes have prize pools — those are entry-fee-free, sponsor-funded, and skill-only (no purchasable advantage). See Terms §7 — Sponsored Competitions.
Ranked vs Casual
- Ranked rounds are paper-only with no power-ups, leveraged at 50x cap, and feed the global Trader Score leaderboard.
- Casual / Gamified rounds allow sabotage power-ups (freeze, force liquidate, news drops). Fun but not Trader Score-eligible — they have their own entertainment leaderboard.
- Sponsored prize-eligible competitions equalize all power-ups so it’s skill-only regardless of mode.
Round duration cheat sheet
Practice 90s Solo + 3 bots, PLAY NOW default Blitz 2min Fast multiplayer, 4-8 players Standard 5min The default multiplayer Long 15min Slow-burn strategy, 4-8 players
What counts toward what
Format XP Streak Win-rate Trader Score Elo Practice Y Y Y — — Multiplayer Y Y Y Y Y Tournament Y Y Y Y Y Sponsored Y Y Y Y Y
Detail on the score itself: Trader Score & Rank.