What is the minimum follower payment for leader fees?
Depending on a follower's subscription, there might be times when their minimum payment would be too small for completing a payment. In these cases, the amount due will be rolled over to the next month until the payment due exceeds the minimum payment amount.
At this time, the minimum payment amount is $5.
That means if a follower has a yearly subscription and accrued less than $5 in fees over the course of one month, those fees will be rolled over into the next month if their subscription won't renew that month.
If Shrimpy will already be charging the follower for a subscription or other payment that is due which sums to more than $5, then the payment will be completed.
For example, if a follower is on a $19 monthly subscription plan and only has $2 in leader fees, Shrimpy will still charge the follower $21 since Shrimpy is already processing another payment for the follower.
When do followers pay their following fees?
Followers that are on a monthly Shrimpy subscription plan will pay their following fees on the same day that they pay for their subscription.
If a follower is on a 6-month or 12-month subscription plan, then the follower will be charged on the day of the month that their subscription was started (so the payments will still be monthly for the leader fees).
Monthly Subscription Example:
Imagine a follower who has a monthly Shrimpy subscription and decides to follow a premium leader. The follower will be charged the following fees on the same day their subscription renews. So, if the follower subscribed to Shrimpy on the 15th of the month, they will pay their following fees each month on the 15th.
Annual Subscription Example:
Imagine a follower who has an annual Shrimpy subscription and decides to follow a premium leader. The follower will be charged the following fees on the same day their subscription was started. So, if the follower subscribed to Shrimpy on the 15th of the month, they will pay their following fees each month on the 15th. However, the subscription cost will still only be charged annually in this case.
What percent of leader fees are taken by Shrimpy?
Shrimpy has a platform fee of 30%. That means 30% of the fees collected by leaders are paid to Shrimpy. These fees are used to maintain Shrimpy, expand the platform, attract more followers to the social program, and continue growing the community.
The remaining 70% will be available for the leader to withdraw from the platform.
Example
If a leader earned $100 in total from followers. Shrimpy would receive $30 and the leader would receive $70.
Leaders can withdraw earnings by navigating to the "Earnings" tab inside the Shrimpy "Settings". Once a PayPal account has been linked, leaders can request a payout.
Following fees are calculated on a monthly basis for each follower based on the day they began their Shrimpy subscription. That means if a follower started a Shrimpy subscription on the 15th of a month, they will also pay following fees on the 15th of each month (if they have incurred any following fees).
Each month, any following fees that were received from followers will show up in the "Pending Earnings" section of the "Payment" tab. On the first of each month, those pending earnings will become available for withdrawal by the leader.
What happens to the high-water mark if funds are deposited or withdrawn from a portfolio following a leader?
Deposits
Funds that are deposited into a portfolio following a leader will not count as "performance" for the sake of charging fees. In other words, you will not incur fees for depositing funds into a portfolio that is already following a premium leader.
Instead, Shrimpy will increase your High Water Mark (HWM) such that it is proportional to the deposited funds. That way charges are not incurred for depositing funds.
Withdrawals
Similar to depositing funds into a portfolio, withdrawing funds from a portfolio following a premium leader will result in the HWM being adjusted.
In the case of withdrawals, the HWM will be adjusted proportionally to the funds that were withdrawn from the portfolio. That way your portfolio will still be accurately charged for performance changes that were due to the leader.
What happens to a follower’s “high water mark” if they stop following a leader and start following another (or the same) leader again?
The high-water mark is set for a portfolio when you start following a leader. Before you are following a leader, there is no high-water mark to track.
Therefore, this means when you stop following a leader, the high-water mark for a portfolio will be reset. Any previous high-water mark will be lost and replaced with a new high-water mark when you follow a new leader (or the same leader).
As a result, we would caution that followers can end up paying for the same performance if they stop and start following a leader, even if it's the same leader.
What actions reset a high water mark?
High water marks are tied to the Leader/Follower relationship. If this relationship ends, high water mark data is lost and cannot be recovered. This is considered having your high water mark reset, if you were to follow the same Leader again (or a new Leader) you would begin with a new high water mark determined by your portfolio balance when you started following another (or the same) Leader again. If you were underwater when you stopped following, it's possible you could be billed for performance that you would not have had you not had a stop-follow event.
Since any action that results in the termination of the Leader/Follower relationship will result in losing your high water mark for that Leader. These actions include but are not limited to:
-
Manual stop follow events
-
Automated stop follow events
-
Allowing your subscription to expire without renewing
-
Exchange API connectivity issues
-
Getting banned from using Social Trading for any reason
-
Deleting the portfolio following a Leader
-
Deleting API keys for the exchange account containing a portfolio following a Leader
-
Deleting your Shrimpy account
Can a high water mark be recovered?
No, as mentioned above, a high water mark cannot be recovered once it has been reset.
Do premium leaders get paid $4 / follower / month by Shrimpy?
No, only free leaders will receive the $4 / follower / month that is paid by Shrimpy. Selecting to receive fees from your followers means you will only be paid based on the fees you collect from your followers.
Free Leaders
Free leaders get paid $4 / follower / month by Shrimpy. This payment comes from a follower's subscription cost.
Notice that the $4 is shared between all leaders that are being followed by the follower.
Followers are not charged anything to follow free leaders.
Premium Leaders
Premium leaders can charge followers based on Assets Under Management or Performance. However, premium leaders will not receive the $4 / follower / month payment from Shrimpy.
Notice that the potential for earnings is far greater for premium leaders. Free leaders generally earn only a fraction of what's possible with premium leaders.
Can leaders have both free and premium portfolios at the same time?
No, each leader must be either 100% free or 100% premium. That means there is currently no way to have both free and premium portfolios for the same leader.
However, if you are a leader on multiple exchanges, each individual leader can select to either be free or premium.
Example:
Imagine you have two different exchange accounts connected to Shrimpy - Binance and KuCoin. If you are a leader on both of those exchanges, you could be a premium leader on Binance and a free leader on KuCoin if you wanted. However, you would not be able to have some free portfolios on Binance and also some premium portfolios under the same Binance leader.
What performance/flat Fees and AUM are premium leaders allowed to charge
Leaders can charge between 0.1% and 3% in AUM fees, between 1% and 30% in performance fees, and between $1 and $1,000 per month in Flat fees.
If my leader switches from being a free leader to a premium leader, will I need to pay?
When a leader switches from being free to premium, followers must explicitly agree to continue following the leader before any charges are made to the follower. Each follower has 7 days to accept or decline these changes. Any person that declines the changes will stop following the leader. Anyone who accepts the changes will begin paying the leader based on the new fee structure. Anyone who fails to respond within 7 days will stop following the leader and won't be charged. You will not be charged anything unless you accept the changes.
How can free leaders switch to become a premium leader?
Leaders that are currently free leaders can switch to becoming a premium leader by going to their leader profile then selecting “Edit Profile” (the button under “Stop being a leader”.)
On the popup that displays after selecting this button, enter the amount you would like to charge your followers in terms of AUM and/or Performance.
Once you select to save these settings, you will immediately become a premium leader. Any person that starts following you after this point will be charged based on your premium fees.
Notice that you can only change your following fees once every 12 hours. Since it is a lot of work to convert followers to a new fee plan, we highly recommend that this action is only taken on rare occasions.