Crypto Glossary

Count of unique addresses participating in on-chain transactions within a time window. A proxy for network usage.

A smart contract that quotes prices algorithmically from a pool of two or more tokens. No order book needed.

Two ways to express yield. APR is the simple rate, APY includes compounding.

Bitcoin's share of total crypto market cap. Rises when BTC outperforms alts, falls during alt seasons.

A public, append-only ledger replicated across many nodes, secured by cryptography and a consensus mechanism.

Volatility envelope around a moving average. Bands expand when volatility rises, contract when it falls.

A chart format that shows open, high, low and close price per time interval. The foundation of technical analysis.

The number of coins that are both publicly mined / issued and not locked — the supply actually tradable today.

When price and an oscillator disagree — price makes a new extreme but the indicator doesn't. Early reversal warning.

A regulated fund that holds crypto (usually BTC or ETH) and trades on traditional stock exchanges.

Moving average that weights recent prices more heavily than older ones. Reacts faster than SMA.

Overlay of market-moving events on the price chart — halvings, ETF decisions, unlocks, hacks and macro prints. Context for every price move.

Net coins moving onto or off centralized exchanges. Big inflows = potential sell pressure, big outflows = accumulation.

Daily 0-100 index that summarizes market sentiment. 0 = extreme fear, 100 = extreme greed.

Horizontal levels drawn from a move's extremes at ratios derived from the Fibonacci sequence. Used to anticipate pullback depth.

Periodic payment between long and short traders on perpetual futures. Keeps the perp price tied to spot.

Payment to the network for including your transaction in a block. Denominated in the native coin (ETH, SOL, BTC).

Scheduled event every ~4 years that cuts Bitcoin's block subsidy in half, reducing new supply issuance.

The loss LPs suffer when the ratio of pooled tokens changes, versus simply holding those tokens.

Forced closure of a leveraged position when margin falls below the maintenance requirement.

Trend + momentum indicator built from two EMAs and a signal line. Classic setup — 12, 26, 9.

Current price multiplied by circulating supply. A rough proxy for how much capital is parked in an asset.

Ratio of market cap to realized cap — signals whether a crypto asset is overheated or undervalued relative to its historical cost basis.

Share of unrealized profit or loss sitting in the market, normalized by market cap — a classic greed and fear indicator.

Cumulative volume that adds volume on up days and subtracts it on down days — a clean way to see whether money is flowing into or out of an asset.

Total notional value of outstanding derivatives contracts. Grows when new positions open, shrinks when positions close.

Futures contract with no expiry. Tracks spot via a periodic funding payment between longs and shorts.

The secret number that proves ownership of a crypto address. Whoever has the key controls the coins.

Aggregate cost basis of the market — the average price at which coins last moved on-chain.

Momentum oscillator bounded between 0 and 100. Classic thresholds — over 70 is overbought, under 30 is oversold.

Ratio of the price at which coins are sold to the price at which they were last bought — are holders taking profit or capitulating?

A crypto token designed to hold a steady value, almost always pegged 1:1 to the US dollar.

Locking up tokens to help secure a Proof-of-Stake network, earning rewards in return.

Price zones where buyers or sellers historically step in. The skeleton of almost every trading setup.

Net aggressive buying vs selling from market takers — who is willing to pay the spread right now, longs or shorts.

Scheduled release of previously locked tokens (team, investors, ecosystem) into circulation.

USD value of assets deposited into a DeFi protocol or chain. The «size» metric of DeFi.

The amount of an asset traded in a given period. Confirms or invalidates price moves.

Software or hardware that stores your private keys and lets you sign transactions on a blockchain.

An address holding enough of an asset to move the market when it transacts.