Reference
Glossary
Every term you will meet on this site and most you will meet elsewhere, defined in one sentence a beginner can read and then explained properly. Where a term is routinely misunderstood, the entry says how.
Consensus & Security22Cryptography8Custody & Access15Data & Measurement27DeFi17Foundations20Institutional Access13Market Structure28Regulation & Policy19Risk & Failure Modes23Scaling & Infrastructure18Stablecoins13Tokens & Supply37
14 terms shown
| Term | Category | In one sentence |
|---|---|---|
| Backfill | Data & Measurement | Filling in historical data for a period that was not collected at the time, by reconstructing it after the fact. |
| Backwardation | Market Structure | A market condition in which futures prices sit below the current spot price, so the curve slopes downward over time. |
| Bankruptcy Claim | Risk & Failure Modes | A creditor's legal claim in a failed company's court process, which determines who gets paid, how much, and in what order. |
| Base Fee | Foundations | The minimum fee per unit of gas that every transaction in an Ethereum block must pay, set by the protocol and destroyed. |
| Basis | Market Structure | The difference between a futures contract's price and the current spot price of the same asset. |
| Blob | Scaling & Infrastructure | A large chunk of temporary data attached to an Ethereum block, priced separately from gas and deleted after a few weeks. |
| Block | Foundations | A batch of transactions recorded together, plus a header that links it to the block before it. |
| Block Builder | Consensus & Security | A specialized party that assembles the contents of a block and sells it to the validator whose turn it is to propose. |
| Block Height | Foundations | The position of a block in the chain, counted from the first block, which sits at height zero. |
| Block Time | Foundations | The average time between blocks on a network, which sets how often new transactions get their first confirmation. |
| Blockchain | Foundations | A shared record of transactions, copied across many computers, where new entries are grouped into blocks and linked in order. |
| Bridge | Scaling & Infrastructure | A system that moves value between two blockchains, usually by locking an asset on one and issuing a representation on the other. |
| Bridge Exploit | Risk & Failure Modes | An attack on the software that moves assets between blockchains, usually by faking the proof that a deposit happened on the other chain. |
| Buyback | Tokens & Supply | A protocol or company using its income to purchase its own token on the market, then either destroying or holding what it buys. |