BY CRYPTO CALAVERA ON 3/19/18 AT 5:30 AM
You’re sitting on Crypto Twitter minding your own business. You’re checking out cashtags of your favorite alts looking for interesting development. All of a sudden, your face gets hit with “The $XYZ coin devs are BURNING 80% of token supply! TO DA MOON!” You’re not really sure what happened, but you’re certain that you didn’t get 80% of that sentence.
You’re a curious individual so you decide to look up those terms and voila! You stumble upon my little article. In the next few minutes I will take you beyond the limits of the traditional English language and we’ll venture forth into the land of crypto-slang! Here are twenty lesser known terms that you will come across in the crypto sphere if you haven’t already. Enjoy!
1. Coin burn — This simply means that the developers will take coins that they own and send them to an address that no-one has the private key for. This makes the coins unusable forever and reduces the amount of coins in circulation. This doesn’t add intrinsic value to the coin but adjusts its valuation accordingly depending on the amount burned. Of course, speculative traders come in and push the price further than the mathematical adjustment. This causes moonboys to pop up screaming “moon time”, effectively pushing the price up even further until it all collapses back to equilibrium.
2. Moonboys — Not your typical “to da moon” advocates. These are advanced moon screamers that won’t only shout “to da moon” but also bash anyone who thinks critically and proposes reasons why a particular asset might not fly “to da moon” based on a rebrand or logo update.
3. Token/coin supply — Usually refers to the amount of coins in circulation. Can also refer to the total amount of coins, including developers’ share which is often locked up and unsellable for 1+ years.
4. OGs — Any cryptocurrency trader and investor that is still around after the 2013–14 Bitcoin bear market. These individuals have ascended beyond the realm of humanity and are divine mysterious beings with varying agendas. They are the reapers of the cryptocurrency space and will not hesitate to syphon every single piece of crypto you own. If you ever come across one in the online forums or on crypto Twitter, stay strong, don’t show any signs of fear or weakness and you may be spared. In the unlikely event you see one in person, shave your head immediately to avoid conflict, go to the nearest tattoo parlor and get their Twitter handle inked on your scalp. You may then commence your eternal worship to the godly being you’ve just met.
5. HODL — This is the most famous of the terms. I am including HODL in the list not because it’s hidden or unknown, but because its origin is grossly misinterpreted. Many believe that HODL is an acronym for “Hold On for Dear Life”. But the origin is much more interesting. It comes from this Bitcointalk thread in December 2013 when things were not looking too hot for Bitcoin. It’s basically a drunken misspell of the word ‘hold’ and essentially means to not sell your assets in times of downturn. Some mainstream media outlets misinterpreted the word and gave it the inaccurate acronym status many know it for today. What a travesty… Don’t be a part of the problem, know your HODL origin and spread the WODR!
6. BCASH — The real name of Bitcoin Cash.
7. BITCONNEEEEEEEEECT — If someone hits you with this one (‘E’ amounts may vary but always more than two) it’s usually because what you’re talking about is a scam. Bitconnect was a company that promised insane 40% per month passive returns on investors’ Bitcoin contributions. The whole pyramid scheme fell apart in early 2018. The slang in question refers to the investor Carlos Matos screaming the company’s name in ecstasy during one of Bitconnect’s conferences:
8. Corn — A loving nickname for Bitcoin.
9. #craefulgang — A term coined by the show Last Week Tonight and its host John Oliver. (SPOILERS AHEAD) This came about after Mr. Oliver made a piece about the cryptocurrency investing and trading space. In the end Oliver and Keegan-Michael Key, impersonating Carlos Matos from Bitconnect, advised people to exercise caution with the help of this trendy hashtag.
10. Muh — A sarcastic misspelling of ‘my’ usually accompanied by ‘bags’ expressing negative sentiment during periods of fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD).
Example: Bitcoin falls 42% as China bans it for the 354th time. Bitcoin hodler: “but muh bags :’(“
11. Nocoiner — A person that does not possess any cryptocurrency at all. Negative connotation, describing a sad and unenlightened individual devoid of the glory that is crypto.
12. Bagholder — A person that is stuck with coins that have gone down a lot in value, usually below his or her entry point. For example, when CNBC advised people to buy Ripple at $2.57, whoever took their advice is now a massive bagholder since Ripple is currently $0.55, or down almost 80%.
13. Rekt — When your position gets absolutely destroyed by an adverse market movement, either to the downside if you’ve gone long or have bought some coins, or to the upside if you’ve gone short or sold off prematurely.
14. Maximalist — Usually preceded with ‘Bitcoin’, maximalists are people who believe that the only thing that is certain is that their coin will survive in the long run.
15. The Flippening — A speculative moment in the future where an altcoin’s market cap will surpass that of Bitcoin. Depending on when you’re reading this, it might have already happened, or it might never happen. Bitcoin and Ethereum maximalists are at the forefront of this great war.
16. Addy — Shortened version of “address” usually meaning your public key or address of your crypto wallet.
17. Dex — This is an acronym for ‘Decentralized Exchange’. These are exchanges that are not powered by a single centralized entity like Bittrex or Binance, but rather from many nodes spread out across the world. IDEX, EtherDelta and ForkDelta are examples of (sh*tty) decentralized exchanges, with IDEX so far being somewhat adequate. The world is still awaiting the time when the great Dex will descend from the heavens and free us from the plague of subpar user experience. Some say that the CryptoBridge dex is the one, others — that it has not been born yet. Only time will tell.
18. Node — A node is quite simply a computer that maintains a cryptocurrency’s network. Nodes in most cryptocurrencies are spread out across the globe, making it impossible for anyone to target the network in one singular place and destroy the ledger entries. This system prevents 51% attacks, because the computational power needed for such an attack to be carried out would have to be greater than all the nodes running the network. That’s the beauty of Bitcoin. Examples of cryptos with centralized nodes are Ripple and NEO currently (each for different reasons and with different structures that you can google). Depending on when you’re reading this, they might have grown up into adult cryptos and become decentralized like they should be.
19. sh*tcoin — Affectionate name for all currencies besides Bitcoin. This includes altcoins as well as legacy coins like USD, EUR, GBP etc.
20. MM — An abbreviation for ‘Market Maker’. This is an ethereal being that magically moves prices of coins up and down with its massive money pot. MMs are usually blamed for general market trends (typically to the downside) by sad and distressed unsuccessful traders to make themselves feel better about their unfortunate situation. Other names for MM are ‘Whales’, ‘Institutional Investors’, ‘Smart Money’ and the like.
That is all! I hope this has given you some insight into the not-so-popular cryptocurrency terms and slang prevalent across the crypto-sphere. If you enjoyed this make sure to hit the Clap button to show your love! ❤
If you want more of this in the future give me a follow on my Twitter and stay tuned!
Happy trading!
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More on me 👇 Crypto Calavera
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