Glossary
Order Book
The live list of open buy and sell offers for a pair, showing price and size at each level.
An order book is the list of unfilled orders on an exchange, with bids on one side and asks on the other. The gap between the best bid and the best ask is the spread, and it is the cost of trading immediately in both directions.
Depth matters more than headline volume. An order book with thousands of dollars resting at the top and nothing behind it will move sharply on any size order, which is where slippage and liquidation risk come from.
On a DEX there is no order book in this sense. The pool's reserves act as the equivalent, and the price you get depends on the size of your trade relative to the pool.
Related terms
Airdrop
Free tokens distributed to wallet addresses, usually to reward early users of a protocol.
AMM
Automated Market Maker — a protocol that prices assets with a formula instead of an order book.
APR vs APY
APR is the yearly rate without compounding; APY includes compounding and is always higher.
ATH
All-Time High — the highest price an asset has ever traded at.
Bear Market
A prolonged decline, conventionally 20% or more from recent highs.
Bull Market
A prolonged rise driven by new demand, easy credit and rising confidence.