Crypto futures glossary
A one-line summary of the terms that appear on the auto-trading screen and signal cards. If you see a word you don't know, look it up here.
39 terms
Basics
- Perpetual futures Perpetual Futures
- A futures contract with no expiry date. The funding rate keeps its price aligned with the spot price. Details →
- Long Long
- A long position that profits when the price rises.
- Short Short
- A short position that profits when the price falls.
- USDT-M futures USDT-margined
- Futures where margin and P&L are calculated in USDT. This is the method SignalNote uses. Details →
- Spot Spot
- A market where you buy and sell coins directly. No leverage.
Funds & orders
- Margin Margin
- The money tied up to open a position. Calculated as position size ÷ leverage.
- Position size Notional
- The actual amount exposed to the market. Quantity × price.
- Leverage Leverage
- The multiple of position size relative to margin. Both profit/loss and liquidation risk grow with it. Details →
- Exit Liquidation
- When losses grow large enough that margin becomes insufficient, the exchange force-closes the position. Details →
- Market order Market order
- An order that fills immediately at the current quoted price. It fills fast, but causes slippage.
- Slippage Slippage
- The difference between the expected price and the actual fill price. Details →
- Funding fee Funding rate
- The cost that longs and shorts exchange every 8 hours on perpetual futures. Details →
- Open interest Open Interest
- The total amount of contracts not yet settled. Shows how much capital is flowing in. Details →
Risk management
- Stop-loss Stop loss
- Closing a position to lock in a loss once the price hits a set level. Details →
- Trailing stop Trailing stop
- A method that raises the stop-loss line as the price moves favorably. It becomes a profit-lock line. Details →
- Risk per trade Risk per trade
- The percentage of your account you lose if a single trade hits its stop loss. Details →
- Max drawdown MDD
- The largest drop from a peak. A key measure of whether a strategy is bearable. Details →
- R-multiple R multiple
- Shows how many times the risk you took was gained or lost. +2R means twice the risk in profit. Details →
- Win rate Win rate
- The percentage of closed trades that ended in profit. Details →
- Profit/loss ratio Profit factor
- Total profit ÷ total loss. Above 1 means the strategy is profitable. Details →
Indicators
- ATR Average True Range
- A measure of recent volatility. Used as a basis for setting stop-loss distance. Details →
- ADX Average Directional Index
- An indicator that measures trend strength. A reading above 20 is usually considered trending. Details →
- RSI Relative Strength Index
- A momentum indicator ranging from 0 to 100. Above 50 signals stronger upward momentum. Details →
- MACD MACD
- An indicator that reads trend reversals from the difference between short- and long-term moving averages. Details →
- EMA Exponential Moving Average
- A moving average that weights recent prices more heavily. Often viewed together at 20, 50, and 200. Details →
- Bollinger Bands Bollinger Bands
- Bands drawn one standard deviation above and below a moving average. Used to read volatility and price position.
- Fear & Greed Index Fear & Greed Index
- An indicator that expresses market sentiment on a scale of 0 to 100. Details →
- Dominance Dominance
- The share of total market capitalization held by a specific coin. Details →
Strategy & validation
- Trend following Trend following
- A method of riding an uptrend and holding until the trend reverses. Details →
- Backtest Backtest
- Re-running a strategy on historical data to calculate its performance. Details →
- Overfitting Overfitting
- When a strategy is tuned too closely to past data and breaks down in live trading. Details →
- Walk-forward validation Walk-forward
- A validation method that fits a strategy on one period and tests it on the next. Details →
- Netting Netting
- A method that offsets orders from multiple strategies and only submits the net quantity. It saves on fees. Details →
- Demo account Demo / Testnet
- An account for trading in a real-like environment using virtual funds. Details →
Account & regulation
- API key API key
- The key that lets a program place orders on your exchange account. Turn off withdrawal permissions. Details →
- Travel Rule Travel Rule
- A regulation that requires exchanging sender and recipient information when transferring crypto assets. Details →
- Destination tag Destination Tag / Memo
- A number used to identify a deposit account on networks like XRP. If omitted, the deposit won't be credited. Details →
- Kimchi premium Kimchi premium
- How much higher domestic exchange prices are compared to overseas prices. Details →
- KYC Know Your Customer
- An exchange's identity verification process. Details →
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