Crypto Glossary: 60 Terms Explained in Plain English

"Send it on TRC20, no memo, then drop the TXID."

If that sentence made perfect sense, you can probably skip this page. If it sounded like code, you're in the right place. Crypto comes with a lot of jargon, and some of it matters more than it looks: misunderstand "network" or "memo" and real money can go missing.

Below are 60 terms you'll meet when you buy, hold, send or sell crypto in Nigeria, in alphabetical order. Where a term deserves more than a paragraph, there's a link to a fuller guide.

Crypto terms from A to Z

A

Address. The string of letters and numbers you share so someone can send you crypto, a bit like an account number. Each address belongs to a particular network, so a USDT address on TRON is not interchangeable with one on Ethereum. See how to find your USDT wallet address.

Airdrop. Free tokens handed out by a project, usually to promote itself or reward early users. Real airdrops never ask you to pay a fee or type in your recovery phrase to "claim". Fake ones do.

All-time high (ATH). The highest price a coin has ever reached. You'll hear "it's 60% below its ATH" as if that makes it a bargain. On its own, it doesn't.

Altcoin. Any coin other than Bitcoin. ETH, SOL, DOGE and thousands of smaller coins are all altcoins.

B

Bear market. A long stretch when prices are mostly falling and the mood is gloomy.

BEP20. The token standard on BNB Smart Chain. "USDT BEP20" means USDT on BNB Smart Chain. Fees are paid in BNB, and addresses start with 0x, just like Ethereum's, which is why people mix the two up.

Block explorer. A website that lets you look up any transaction or address on a blockchain, like a public statement for the whole network. mempool.space (Bitcoin) and Tronscan (TRON) are two examples. See how to use a blockchain explorer.

Blockchain. A shared record of transactions kept by many computers at once, grouped into blocks that are chained together in order. Once a block has been built on, changing it is practically impossible, which is why crypto transfers can't be reversed.

Bull market. A long stretch when prices are mostly rising, and everyone at the Christmas party suddenly has crypto tips.

C

Cold wallet. A wallet whose keys are kept offline, such as a hardware device. Harder to hack, slower to use.

Confirmation. When your transaction is added to a block, it has one confirmation; every block added after that counts as another. Apps wait for a number of them before crediting a deposit. See blockchain confirmations explained.

Custodial wallet. A wallet where a company holds the keys and you sign in to an account, much like a bank account. Your KWIQ wallets work this way. The opposite is a non-custodial or self-custody wallet, where you hold the keys yourself. See custodial vs non-custodial wallets.

D

DCA (dollar-cost averaging). Buying a fixed amount at regular intervals, say ₦20,000 every payday, instead of trying to guess the perfect moment. Read dollar-cost averaging with naira.

DeFi (decentralised finance). Lending, borrowing, trading and other financial services run by smart contracts instead of a company. Clever, but mistakes and hacks are usually final.

DEX (decentralised exchange). An exchange that runs on smart contracts. You trade straight from your own wallet, with no account and no support desk.

E

ERC20. The token standard on Ethereum. "USDT ERC20" means USDT on Ethereum. Fees are paid in ETH and can be high when the network is busy.

Escrow. Holding funds until both sides of a deal have done their part. On a P2P marketplace, the platform locks the seller's crypto in escrow until the buyer pays. If a "seller" asks you to pay outside escrow, cancel.

F

Fiat. Government-issued money, such as the naira, the dollar or the pound.

FOMO (fear of missing out). The feeling that pushes people to buy after a coin has already shot up. It's behind a lot of buying at the top.

Fork. A change to a blockchain's rules. A hard fork can split a chain in two and create a new coin, which is how Bitcoin Cash came out of Bitcoin in 2017.

Futures. Contracts that let you bet on a coin's price without owning it, usually with borrowed money. Losses can be fast and total. Our advice: start with spot, not futures. See spot vs futures trading.

G

Gas. The fee for doing anything on Ethereum and similar networks, paid in the network's own coin. "Gas is high" means sending is expensive right now. See crypto network fees explained.

H

Halving. An event built into Bitcoin, roughly every four years, that cuts the number of new bitcoins created with each block in half.

HODL. Slang for holding through ups and downs instead of selling. It started as a misspelling of "hold" in a 2013 forum post and stuck.

Hot wallet. A wallet connected to the internet, such as an app on your phone. Convenient for everyday use, but more exposed to hacks and malware than a cold wallet.

K

KYC (know your customer). Identity checks a platform carries out, such as asking for your BVN, NIN, an ID card or a selfie. Most established platforms require them before you can do much.

L

Leverage. Trading with borrowed money to make your position bigger. With 10x leverage, a 10% move against you can wipe out everything you put in.

Limit order. An order to buy or sell only at a price you set, or better. It might never fill if the price doesn't get there.

M

Market cap. A coin's price multiplied by the number of coins in circulation. A coin priced at ₦5 isn't "cheap" if there are trillions of them. See market cap explained.

Market order. An order to buy or sell immediately at the best price available. Quick, but in a thin market you may get a worse price than you expected.

Memecoin. A coin built around a joke, a mascot or an online trend rather than a product. Dogecoin was the first famous one. Most lose almost all their value.

Memo (or tag). An extra code some coins need when you send to an exchange, so it knows which customer the deposit belongs to. On XRP it's called a destination tag. Include it if the receiving app shows one; leave the field empty if it doesn't. See memo and destination tags.

Mempool. The waiting room for transactions that have been sent but not yet added to a block. When the Bitcoin mempool is crowded, low-fee transactions wait longer.

Mining. How proof-of-work networks such as Bitcoin add new blocks: computers compete to solve a puzzle, and the winner earns newly created coins plus fees.

N

Network. The blockchain a coin or token travels on. USDT, for example, runs on TRON, BNB Smart Chain, Ethereum and others, and you must send on the same network as the receiving address. Of every term here, this is the one that costs beginners the most. See USDT networks explained.

Network fee. What you pay a blockchain to process your transfer. It goes to the miners or validators who process transactions (some networks burn part of it), and it rises and falls with demand.

NFT (non-fungible token). A token that stands for one specific item, such as a piece of digital art or a game character, rather than an interchangeable unit like USDT.

O

Off-ramp. A service that turns crypto into local money. Selling USDT on KWIQ and withdrawing naira to your OPay account is using an off-ramp.

On-ramp. The opposite: turning naira or another fiat currency into crypto.

P

P2P (peer-to-peer). Buying or selling directly with another person, usually through a marketplace with escrow. You get plenty of offers, but also a stranger in the deal, which is where fake alerts and reversed transfers come from. See how to avoid P2P scams.

Private key. The secret that controls a crypto address. Anyone who has it can move the funds. Your seed phrase can recreate your private keys, so guard both.

Proof of stake. A way of securing a blockchain where validators lock up coins for the right to add blocks. Ethereum, Solana and BNB Smart Chain use versions of it.

Proof of work. Securing a blockchain through mining, where computers spend electricity solving puzzles. Bitcoin, Litecoin and Dogecoin use it.

Pump and dump. A scheme where a group hypes a small coin, pushes the price up, then sells to the people who bought late. If a Telegram group tells you exactly when to buy, ask yourself who is selling to you.

R

Rug pull. When a project's creators take investors' money and disappear, often by draining the token's trading pool. See what is a rug pull.

S

Satoshi (sat). The smallest unit of Bitcoin: one hundred-millionth of a BTC. You don't need to buy a whole bitcoin. Try our satoshi converter to see what a few thousand sats are worth.

Seed phrase. A list of 12 or 24 words that backs up a self-custody wallet. Whoever has the words has the money. Never type it into a website or read it out to "support". See seed phrase explained.

Slippage. The difference between the price you expected and the price you actually got, common in fast-moving or thinly traded markets.

Smart contract. A program that runs on a blockchain and does exactly what its code says. USDT on TRON, for instance, is managed by a smart contract.

Spot trading. Buying and selling the actual coin at the current price. You own what you buy, and you can't lose more than you put in.

Spread. The gap between the price a platform buys at and the price it sells at. A wide spread is a cost even when no "fee" is shown.

Stablecoin. A coin designed to hold a steady value, usually one US dollar. USDT and USDC are the best known. See what is USDT.

Staking. Locking up coins to help secure a proof-of-stake network in exchange for rewards. Rewards aren't guaranteed, the coin's price can still fall, and staked coins can take time to withdraw.

Swap. Exchanging one coin for another directly, such as USDT for BTC. On KWIQ, crypto-to-crypto swaps cost 2%, while swapping crypto to naira is free.

T

Token. A coin issued on top of another blockchain rather than running its own. USDT on TRON is a token; TRX is TRON's own coin.

TRC20. The token standard on TRON. "USDT TRC20" means USDT on TRON. Addresses start with T, and fees are paid in TRX.

TXID (transaction ID or hash). The unique reference for one blockchain transaction, a bit like the session ID on a bank transfer receipt. Support teams ask for it because it shows what was sent, when and where. TXIDs are public, so sharing one is safe.

V

Volatility. How much and how fast a price moves. High volatility means big swings in both directions. Stablecoins are designed to have very little.

W

Wallet. Software or a device that holds the keys to your crypto and lets you send and receive. The word can mean an app on your phone, a hardware device, or a coin's balance inside an app like KWIQ.

Whitepaper. The document a project publishes to explain what it does and how. Bitcoin's is nine pages long, and it's still worth reading.

Three mix-ups worth avoiding

Knowing the words is one thing. These are the confusions that most often turn into lost money:

• TRC20 vs BEP20 vs ERC20. Same coin name, different networks. BEP20 and ERC20 addresses look identical, so always go by the network named on the receiving deposit screen.
• Memo vs no memo. A missing memo can leave your deposit stuck on an exchange. A made-up memo, where none was asked for, never helps. Copy exactly what the receiving app shows.
• Support vs seed phrase. Anyone who asks for your seed phrase, password, PIN or one-time code is not support, whatever their profile picture says.

Put the words to work

The quickest way to make this vocabulary stick is to see it in use. Download the KWIQ app, open any coin's wallet and you'll see an address and its network; go to sell and you'll see the rate and the naira amount before you confirm. If your phone is short on space, you can create a free account on the web instead.