Glossary

A

admin fee — portion of the LP-side value change (post-watermark-recovery) routed to admin fees and eventually to veYB holders. Formula: $f_a = 1 - (1 - f_{\min}) \cdot \sqrt{1 - s/T}$, where $s/T$ is the staking ratio. See Fee Mechanics and Math Primer §5.1.

AMM (LEVAMM) — AMM.vy in yb-core. The leveraged constant-product market maker holding Curve LP tokens as collateral and crvUSD as debt. Posts quotes via an oracle-informed invariant; arbs trade against those quotes, keeping the position near $L = 2$. See Compounding Leverage.

arbitrageur — external actor who trades between LEVAMM (via VirtualPool) and Cryptoswap, closing the price gap for profit. Each profitable arb trade simultaneously moves LEVAMM back toward $L = 2$.

B

base APY — PPS growth for unstaked yb-LP holders. Does not accrue to staked positions; stakers earn only YB emissions. Never sum base APY and emissions APR for a gauge staker.

C

compounding leverage — continuous maintenance of a constant leverage ratio. At $L = 2$ on a Curve LP position, cancels volatility drag. See Compounding Leverage.

Cryptoswap — Curve's dynamic-peg AMM family (Twocrypto / Tricrypto). YB holds positions in these pools. Internal admin_fee = 50% routes half of pool trading fees to the rebalance reserve (via xcp_profit) and half to LP virtual_price growth.

crvUSD — Curve's over-collateralised stablecoin. The debt side of every LEVAMM position.

F

Factory — Factory.vy. Atomically deploys YB markets (LT + AMM + VirtualPool + oracle + gauge) from blueprints. All markets deployed by one Factory share the same LEVERAGE (typically 2).

FeeDistributor — FeeDistributor.vy. Receives admin-fee flow from each market's LT and distributes to veYB holders weekly (every Thursday 00:00 UTC) with 4-week smoothing. Payouts are in ybBTC tokens per market, not in YB or crvUSD.

fundamental value — synonym for PPS in YieldBasis user-facing terminology. The per-share value as the vault accounts for it at oracle price, reported by LT.pricePerShare(). Distinct from redemption value (below). See Fundamental Value, vs Redemption Value, and TRD.

G

gauge — per-market staking + emission contract (LiquidityGauge.vy). Accepts yb-LP deposits, mints strict ERC-4626 gauge shares, distributes YB emissions and up to 8 custom reward tokens.

gauge voting — veYB holders allocate emission weight across gauges via GaugeController.vote_for_gauge_weights. Votes apply instantly, with a 10-day cooldown per-gauge re-vote.

H

Hybrid Vault — per-address vault that ties YB pool access to proportional crvUSD backing. Backing is held in a governance-allow-listed ERC-4626 vault (scrvUSD by default). Stablecoin fraction is currently 55% (governance-adjustable). Earns scrvUSD yield on backing plus YB returns on pool positions. See Hybrid Vaults.

I

ideal_staked — target value of the staked side, stored in LT.liquidity. Rises when yb-LP is staked; does not fall when the staked side takes a loss. When staked < ideal_staked, admin-fee flow routes to the staked side first until parity is restored (Recovery Mode). See Watermark & Recovery.

impermanent loss (IL) — LP underperformance versus a linear hold, due to the $\sqrt{p}$ shape of the Cryptoswap LP value curve. Curve geometry, not a fee. Cancelled at the yb-LP depositor level by 2× leverage convexity; see volatility drag.

L

LEVAMM — see AMM.

LiquidityGauge — LiquidityGauge.vy. Strict ERC-4626 wrapper over yb-LP shares. Holding gauge shares is how you stake. Emits YB and optional custom reward tokens.

LP (Curve LP) — liquidity-provider tokens issued by Curve Cryptoswap pools. LEVAMM holds these as collateral.

LT — LT.vy. ERC-20 vault contract that mints yb-LP. ERC-4626-like (emits ERC-4626 Deposit/Withdraw events, has preview_deposit / preview_withdraw) but not strictly compliant — custom deposit(assets, debt, …) signature, no convertToAssets / mint / redeem on the contract itself. Strict ERC-4626 lives on LiquidityGauge.

O

oracle price — external reference price used by LEVAMM for sandwich-resistant value computation. Comes from CryptopoolLPOracle + price aggregator; EMA-smoothed so a flash-loan can't move it within one block.

P

permalock — maximum-duration (4-year) YB lock with no decay, giving constant full veYB power. Toggleable. Can be transferred to another permalocked position under strict conditions. See veYB.

PPS (price per share) — total × 1e18 / supply_tokens as reported by LT.pricePerShare(). Oracle-priced, sandwich-resistant. The vault's fundamental per-share value. See Fundamental Value, Redemption Value, and TRD.

price_scale — Cryptoswap's internal peg; the price around which liquidity is concentrated. Rebalances internally via the pool's fee-funded mechanism (independent of user/arb trades).

PPS drag — slow PPS growth caused by cumulative rebalance slippage outrunning fee inflow over a period. Baked into PPS itself; not recoverable by waiting, only by forward fees outpacing forward drag. Distinct from TRD (transient) and watermark shortfall (staked-side-only, recoverable via fee routing).

R

rebalance slippage — cost of moving price_scale or of continuous $L = 2$ rebalancing on LEVAMM. Offset at the protocol level by the refueling loop (borrower interest donated to the pool as reserve).

Recovery Mode — state where staked < ideal_staked. All admin-fee flow routes to the staked side first, at 100% (no admin take), until parity is restored.

redemption value — what you actually receive if you withdraw right now. Computed by LT.preview_withdraw(shares) via Cryptoswap's calc_withdraw_fixed_out. Lags PPS when Cryptoswap state and LEVAMM target are out of sync; the gap is TRD.

Refueling — donation cycle where crvUSD borrower interest accrued in LEVAMM is swept by LT and donated to the Cryptoswap pool as rebalance reserve. 100% of collected interest flows through this loop. Not LP yield; a closed accounting loop between leverage cost and rebalance subsidy. See Refueling & Donations.

S

scrvUSD — Curve's savings-crvUSD ERC-4626 vault. The default (and most common) backing option for Hybrid Vaults. Any governance-allow-listed ERC-4626 crvUSD-denominated vault can serve this role.

staked yb-LP — yb-LP held inside a LiquidityGauge. Earns YB emissions only — does not accrue unstaked PPS growth. Exposed to watermark drawdown (recoverable via fee routing). See Staked vs Unstaked Economics.

staking ratio — staked / total_supply of an LT. Drives the admin-fee formula and the per-gauge emission adjustment.

T

TRD (Temporary Redemption Discount) — preview_withdraw(1e18) / pricePerShare() − 1. The signed gap between what 1 share redeems for now (LT.preview_withdraw) and its fundamental per-share value (LT.pricePerShare). Negative TRD is the common case during high volatility or drawdowns (e.g. −1% means a share redeems for 1% less than its books value). Positive TRD is the rare premium case. Zero means the two are aligned. Resolves via arbitrage — hours to a few weeks depending on volume. See TRD.

U

unstaked yb-LP — yb-LP held in the user's wallet (not in the gauge). Earns PPS growth from fee flow. Shares are ERC-20 transferrable. No YB emissions.

V

veYB — vote-escrowed YB. ERC-721 NFT minted by VotingEscrow.vy when YB is locked. Lock 1 week to 4 years (linear decay) or permalock (no decay). Grants governance votes, gauge-weight votes, and a weekly share of admin fees (paid in ybBTC tokens). See veYB.

VirtualPool — VirtualPool.vy. Wraps LEVAMM + Cryptoswap + flash loan to expose direct crvUSD↔asset swaps. The arb path — LEVAMM does not trade directly against users.

volatility drag — LP underperformance vs a linear hold, a consequence of the LP value curve's $\sqrt{p}$ shape (concave). Cancelled at the depositor level by wrapping the LP in 2× leverage — the convexity of the leveraged position offsets the concavity of the LP, yielding a linear net payoff. Not removed from the underlying Cryptoswap pool; experienced only by the yb-LP depositor as if cancelled.

W

watermark — user-facing name for ideal_staked in LT.vy. The high-water mark value of the staked side that future fees must restore before any admin fee is charged. See Watermark & Recovery.

Y

YB — YieldBasis governance token. ERC-20, hard-capped at 1,000,000,000 YB total supply. Deployed 15 September 2025. Utility activates only when locked into veYB. See YB Token.

ybBTC / ybETH — user-facing name for yb-LP tokens in BTC-pair or ETH-pair markets respectively (e.g. yb-tBTC, yb-cbBTC, yb-WBTC, yb-WETH). Each is the LT share of a specific market.

yb-LP — ERC-20 vault share minted by LT.vy. Represents a pro-rata claim on a 2×-leveraged Curve LP position held inside LEVAMM. Transferrable while held in the user's wallet (unstaked); non-transferrable while held by a LiquidityGauge (staked). LT is ERC-4626-like but not strict; strict ERC-4626 lives on the gauge wrapper.