Glossary

A

Agent

A key that trades for an account within a policy the chain enforces. It is registered by the account, signs as a session of the account, and can never withdraw. See Agents.

Auto-deleveraging

When a liquidation leaves a loss larger than the position's margin, the chain closes the most profitable opposing positions to cover it.

B

Batch

A fixed run of consecutive heights that the validators agree on as a whole. Matching, liquidation and funding run at batch boundaries.

Bridged USDC

USDC on Vordium, backed 1:1 by USDC held in the Vordium vault on Arbitrum One.

C

Capability

A kind of action an agent's policy allows: place, cancel, modify, take-profit and stop-loss, close, vault.

CoreWriter

The contract at 0x7777…7777 through which an EVM contract trades and moves funds on VordCore. See CoreWriter.

Cross margin

A margin mode, on the testnet, where every cross position of an account shares one margin.

D

Dead-man switch

A time an account arms with ScheduleCancel: if it is not moved forward before it passes, the chain cancels the account's orders.

E

Epoch

A fixed number of heights at whose boundaries the validator set changes.

F

Funding

Payments between longs and shorts of a perpetual market, settled every interval at a batch boundary.

G

Genesis

The chain's first state. Its sha256 hash identifies the chain, and every signature is bound to it.

H

Height

A slot with a leader. It holds a block when its leader produced one, and is empty otherwise.

I

Index price

The reference price funding compares a market's price against.

Insurance fund

A system account that receives a share of every liquidation fee.

Isolated margin

A margin mode in which each position has its own margin and its own liquidation price.

J

Jail

What happens to a validator that misbehaves or goes offline: it stops voting, leading and earning until it is unjailed.

L

Leader

The validator that may produce the block of a height.

Liquidation price

The exact price at which the engine closes a position, served with each position.

M

Maintenance margin

The margin a position must keep, measured at the mark price; below it, the position is liquidated.

Mark price

The price margin, liquidation and the price band are measured against.

Market Maker Protection

Limits an account sets on fills inside a window; reaching one cancels its orders and freezes new ones for a while.

N

Network spec

The document each network publishes describing itself: chain id, genesis, endpoints, rules and status.

O

Oracle price

The price the validators supply for a market. A validator's price counts only while it is fresh.

P

Post Only

A limit order that only rests on the book: if it would trade at once, it is refused.

Price band

The furthest through the mark a limit order on the marketable side may be priced.

R

Reduce only

An order that may only make a position smaller.

S

Seat

A place in the validator set. Seated validators vote and lead heights.

Session

A key the account authorises with SessionCreate to sign its orders. It holds no funds and can never withdraw. An account holds one session at a time.

State root

A Merkle root of the whole state, one per batch.

T

TWAP

A large order split into slices placed over a chosen time.

V

VORD

The chain's native token, with 18 decimals and no token contract. Gas on the EVM lane is paid in VORD.

VordCore

The trading engine inside the chain: the order book, matching, margin, liquidation, funding and the oracle.

VordiumBFT

Vordium's Byzantine fault tolerant consensus. A block is final once the validators certify it.