THE VAULT · crypto intelligence

Crypto Trading Glossary

The derivatives and market-structure terms behind The Vault, defined in plain English — the same concepts our briefs and the live Edge terminal are built on.

Everything here is information and education, never financial advice.

Basis
The difference between an asset's futures price and its spot price, often expressed as a percentage.
Breakout
When price moves decisively beyond a defined support, resistance, or range boundary.
Drawdown
The decline from a peak value to a subsequent trough, usually expressed as a percentage.
Funding Rate
A periodic payment between long and short holders of a perpetual futures contract that keeps its price tethered to spot.
Leverage
Using borrowed funds to control a position larger than the trader's own collateral, amplifying gains and losses.
Liquidation
The forced closing of a leveraged position by an exchange when collateral can no longer cover the position's losses.
Liquidity
How easily an asset can be bought or sold near the current price without causing a large move.
Long/Short Ratio
A measure comparing the number or size of long positions to short positions among a set of traders.
Market Maker
A participant that continuously posts buy and sell orders, providing liquidity and earning the spread.
Market Structure
The pattern of highs and lows that describes whether a market is trending, ranging, or transitioning.
Moving Average
A line that smooths price by averaging it over a chosen number of periods to reveal the underlying direction.
Open Interest
The total number of outstanding derivative contracts that have not yet been closed or settled.
Order Book
A real-time list of outstanding buy and sell orders for an asset, organized by price level.
Perpetual Futures
A derivative contract that tracks an asset's price with no expiry date, held near spot via funding payments.
Position Sizing
The process of deciding how large a position to take relative to total capital and risk tolerance.
Range
A period when price oscillates between relatively stable upper and lower boundaries without trending.
Relative Strength Index (RSI)
A momentum oscillator that measures the speed of recent price changes on a scale from 0 to 100.
Slippage
The difference between the expected price of a trade and the price at which it actually executes.
Spot vs. Futures
The distinction between buying an asset outright (spot) and trading a contract based on its price (futures).
Stablecoin
A cryptocurrency designed to hold a steady value, usually pegged to a fiat currency such as the US dollar.
Support & Resistance
Price levels where buying or selling interest has historically been strong enough to slow or pause moves.
Trend
A sustained directional bias in price, characterized by a sequence of higher or lower swings.
Volatility
A measure of how much and how quickly an asset's price moves over a given period.
Volume Profile
A chart showing how much trading volume occurred at each price level over a chosen period.
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