Exchange glossary
Glossary
Short answers to the words you meet when exchanging crypto: networks, fees, checks, rate. Each explanation is a few lines, with no run-up.
A
AlipayAlipay is a non-bank payment institution of China licensed by the PBOC; the account is held in yuan, and the detail for a transfer is the account name, that is, an email or a phone number. Without full verification the receiving limit is 5,000 CNY a year, and the money received cannot be disposed of. A tourist prepaid card cannot accept a transfer at all.AMLAML stands for anti-money-laundering rules. In crypto exchange it means checking where the funds came from: the sender's address is matched against databases and scored for links to theft, sanctions or darknet marketplaces. It is the money that is checked, not the person — that is what separates AML from KYC.
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BEP20BEP20 is the token standard on BNB Smart Chain. The fee is paid in BNB and usually amounts to a fraction of a dollar. The address looks exactly like an Ethereum address, starting with 0x, so the network has to be selected and checked by hand when you send.BLIKBLIK is a Polish payment system: paying with a six-digit code from a banking app and transferring to a phone number. BLIK has no system limit at all — the transfer amount is set by the sender's bank, and at the largest Polish banks it varies from 500 to 5,000 zloty. A transfer to a phone number takes about fifteen seconds, around the clock.BlockchainA blockchain is a shared record of every transfer, kept not by one organisation but by thousands of independent participants at once. Records are gathered into blocks, and each block refers to the one before it. An old record cannot be altered unnoticed: it will not match everyone else's copy.
C
Cold and hot walletsA cold wallet keeps your keys offline, on a separate device or on paper. A hot wallet works online: an app or a browser extension. Cold is safer and slower, hot is more convenient and more exposed; most people keep both.CryptocurrencyCryptocurrency is money that exists only as records on a blockchain, with no bank and no central issuer. Ownership is proven by a key, not by a document: whoever holds the key holds the funds. A transfer goes straight between addresses and cannot be reversed.
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ERC20ERC20 is the token standard on the Ethereum network. Most tokens in existence were issued under it, USDT and USDC among them. The fee is paid in ETH and depends on how busy the network is rather than on the amount sent: cents in a quiet hour, tens of dollars at peak.Exchange reserveReserve is the amount an exchange service holds in a given direction right now. An order larger than the reserve will not settle immediately, even if the rate is displayed. That is why the reserve is checked before an order is created, not after.
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SafePalSafePal is two products under one name: a hardware wallet and an app that works without the device as well. A swap and a transfer of a token between networks both cost 0.2% inside the app as of 19.09.2026 — the same rate, with no separate raised charge for cross-chain. On top of that 0.2% come the network fee and the rate of an outside provider, which the vendor does not publish.SEPASEPA is the single euro payments area, 41 countries. An ordinary transfer must be delivered by the bank no later than the next banking day; an instant one, by law, in no more than 10 seconds, at any hour and on any calendar day. Since 9 October 2025 a euro-area bank must check the payee's name against the IBAN and show the mismatch before the payment is confirmed.SpreadSpread is the difference between the buy rate and the sell rate. An exchange buys USDT cheaper than it sells it, and that difference is its earnings. The narrower the spread, the better the deal: a fee may be absent entirely, but a spread is always there.StablecoinA stablecoin is a cryptocurrency pegged to an ordinary currency, most often the dollar. One USDT or USDC is worth about one dollar and barely moves in calm times. Such coins are used to hold money in crypto without depending on price swings.StakingStaking is locking coins in a network in return for a reward. The locked funds take part in confirming transfers, and the owner receives a share of new coins for it. The income is not guaranteed, and staked coins are usually unavailable for sale while they are locked.
T
TokenA token is a digital unit issued on top of someone else's blockchain. A coin has its own network: bitcoin lives on the bitcoin network, ether on Ethereum. A token has no network of its own, it uses another one and pays its fee, which is how USDT, USDC and thousands of others work.TONTON is a blockchain of its own; since 15.06.2026 the network's coin has been called GRAM, formerly Toncoin. A USDT transfer here cost $0.0016 on 19.09.2026 — 1,330 times cheaper than TRC20 — and a first receipt into an empty address is no dearer than an ordinary one, unlike on TRON. But USDT on TON is only 0.74% of the whole issue, the fifth network by volume.TonkeeperTonkeeper has been renamed Keeper, and the coin of the TON network has been called GRAM instead of Toncoin since 15.06.2026 — the wallet's old domain now redirects to the new one. It is a non-custodial wallet: one address for both the coin and USDT, and the token can be received on a zero balance. A USDT transfer in this network cost $0.0016 on 19.09.2026.Transaction hash (TXID)TXID is the unique ID of a transfer on the blockchain. Anyone can use it to verify that the transfer happened: the amount, the time, the sender and recipient addresses. It is exactly what exchange support asks for when a payment needs to be found.TRC20TRC20 is the token standard on the TRON network. USDT is most often transferred on it: a transfer takes about a minute, and the fee is paid in TRX, not in USDT: about two dollars in autumn 2026, and twice that to a wallet that has never held USDT. A TRC20 address accepts only funds from this same network, so the same USDT on another network will not arrive there.TrezorTrezor is a hardware wallet: the key is created inside the device and stays there, and every transfer is confirmed by hand on its screen. Against an infected computer that protects you; against a recovery phrase talked out of you, or a signature you put there yourself, it does not. The line that “Trezor does not support TRC20” is wrong: that limit belongs to a third-party app, not the device.TronLinkTronLink is a non-custodial wallet for the TRON network: the keys sit on your device, and a single address takes TRX and every token on the network. A USDT transfer “eats” TRX because the network charges in energy, and there is no free energy allowance. Three quarters of the charge is a surcharge on the congested USDT contract: 49,635 penalty units of the 64,285 spent, measured 19.09.2026.
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Wallet addressA wallet address is the string funds are sent to, much like an account number. Every network has its own address format, and a transfer will only travel inside the network the address was issued for. Sending to a wrong address cannot be undone.WiseWise is not a bank, and that is written into the agreement itself: a Wise account is not a bank account and the money is not covered by deposit insurance. In the United Kingdom it is an electronic money institution, in the EU a payment institution in Belgium. For residents of Ukraine Wise works for sending only: you cannot receive money into a Wise account while living in Ukraine.