Glossary
A reference of key terms used throughout the Zenex documentation.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Perpetual futures (perps) | Derivative contracts that let you speculate on an asset's price without expiry |
| Oracle | Off-chain price feed (Pyth Lazer) that provides real-time asset prices to the protocol |
| Collateral | Funds deposited to back a position and absorb losses |
| Leverage | Multiplier that amplifies exposure beyond deposited collateral |
| Notional size | The total value of a single position (collateral x leverage) |
| Open interest (OI) | The sum of all notional sizes on one side of a market. Long OI and short OI are tracked separately |
| Margin | The initial margin requirement that determines maximum leverage per market |
| PnL | Profit and Loss, the unrealized gain or loss on an open position |
| Equity | Collateral + PnL - Fees, determines position health |
| Liquidation threshold (liq_fee) | The equity level below which a position can be liquidated, configurable per market and must be less than the market's margin |
| Liquidation | Forced closure of a position when equity falls below the liquidation threshold |
| Vault | Liquidity pool that provides the funds for leveraged trading |
| Vault shares | Token representing proportional ownership of the vault's total assets |
| Utilization | Ratio of open interest to available vault capacity |
| Funding rate | Continuously accruing cost/credit between longs and shorts, recalculated hourly based on open interest imbalance, settled on position close |
| Borrowing interest | Time-based interest paid by positions, scales with vault and market utilization |
| Keeper | Permissionless actor that executes limit fills, liquidations, and trigger orders |
| ADL (Auto-deleveraging) | Safety mechanism that reduces winning positions when the vault nears insolvency |
| Smart Account | A passkey- or social-login-controlled on-chain account created without a seed phrase or browser extension. Enables Quick Trading via session keys |
| Quick Trading | A UI feature (also called session keys) that authorizes a temporary signing key on a smart account so trades can be submitted without a per-transaction wallet prompt |
| Passkey | A WebAuthn credential stored in the user's device or password manager that signs transactions for a smart account in place of a seed phrase |
| Browser Wallet | A Stellar wallet provided by a browser extension or hardware device (Freighter, xBull, Lobstr, Albedo, Hana, Ledger, Hot Wallet) that signs transactions directly |