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Level 3 of 4

Advanced crypto: how the machinery works

For active DeFi users and traders who want the mechanics, not the marketing.

Start with guide oneFind your level
16Guides
3 hrsTotal reading
4Tracks
$0Cost
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The whole level Start at the beginning 16 guides, about 3 hours 21 minutes of reading. Take them in order or jump to the track you need.
Start with guide one
Level 3 of 4

Is this your level?

For active DeFi users and traders who want the mechanics, not the marketing.

Who this is for

You use DeFi regularly, you have held a liquidity position or a leveraged one, and you can read a block explorer without help. You want to understand the machinery well enough to predict how it behaves under stress: pricing curves, MEV, derivatives, oracles, liquidation engines and the data that shows what is really happening onchain.

Before you start

Comfortable with these? Then you are in the right place. If any of them are new, the Intermediate level covers them first.

By the end

What you will be able to do once this level is behind you.

  • Derive AMM prices and price impact yourself instead of trusting the quote
  • Explain every kind of MEV and choose the right protection for a trade
  • Model a perpetual, an option or a basis trade, including how each one fails
  • Judge an oracle, a lending market or a stablecoin by its failure modes
  • Tell exactly who can change a contract and how quickly they can do it
  • Decode transactions, follow funds and write your own onchain queries
The tracks

Four tracks, in the order they build on each other

Each track stands on its own, so jump to the one you need. Read in order and every guide can lean on the one before it.

Track 1

Market structure

How onchain trades are really priced and filled: the curve math, the searchers in the gaps, the solvers competing for your order, and liquidity as a strategy.

4 guides51 minNot startedStart this trackTrack 2

Derivatives

Perpetuals, options and basis trades from the mechanism up, and how to read the derivatives data everybody quotes and few people interpret correctly.

4 guides51 minNot startedStart this trackTrack 3

Protocol risk

The four places protocols break: prices coming in, collateral going out, pegs under pressure, and the keys that can change the rules.

4 guides47 minNot startedStart this trackTrack 4

Onchain analysis

Read any transaction down to the event logs, follow money across wallets, analyze token supply properly, and query the chain yourself.

4 guides52 minNot startedStart this track
Every guide

All 16, with the reading time for each

01AMM math: constant product, concentrated liquidity and ticksEvery quote you have ever accepted on a DEX came out of a few lines of algebra. Here they are.Advanced10 min readMarket structure02MEV explained: sandwiches, arbitrage, liquidations and protectionEvery pending trade is a price signal. Here is who reads it, what they take, and how to give them nothing.Advanced14 min readMarket structure03Order books, RFQ, intents and solversA swap is one way to trade. Here are the others, how each sets your price, and how each can fail.Advanced13 min readMarket structure04LP as a strategy: LVR, ranges and JIT liquidityYour fees are the income. Arbitrageurs are the cost. Here is the arithmetic that decides which one wins.Advanced14 min readMarket structure05Perpetual futures under the hoodNo expiry and no delivery: a funding payment every few hours does the job that settlement does for a dated future.Advanced15 min readDerivatives06Crypto options and the GreeksOptions put a price on the one thing spot and perps cannot: how far the market expects price to move.Advanced13 min readDerivatives07Basis trades, funding carry and delta neutral positionsLong spot, short the future, collect the difference. Easy to describe, and full of details that decide whether it works.Advanced12 min readDerivatives08Reading derivatives data: open interest, funding and liquidationsEvery contract has a buyer and a seller. Keep that in mind and most derivatives charts become far easier to read.Advanced11 min readDerivatives09Oracles: how prices get onchain and how they failEvery liquidation, every perp fill and every stablecoin mint starts with one number read from one contract.Advanced14 min readProtocol risk10Inside a lending protocol: rate curves, liquidations and bad debtEvery rate you see on a lending dashboard comes out of one short formula. So does every liquidation.Advanced12 min readProtocol risk11How pegs hold and how they breakA dollar onchain is an arbitrage that has to keep working. Here is what makes it work, and what breaks it.Advanced11 min readProtocol risk12Upgradeability, admin keys and timelocksCode is law only if the code cannot change. Here is how to find out who can change it, and how fast.Advanced10 min readProtocol risk13Reading a transaction like an analystAn explorer page is a summary. Underneath it are four bytes, a few 32 byte words and a handful of logs, and you can read every one.Advanced15 min readOnchain analysis14Following the money: flows and clusteringEvery transfer is public. Who stands behind an address is not. Tracing is the craft of reasoning carefully across that gap.Advanced13 min readOnchain analysis15Supply analysis: emissions, unlocks, float and market makersPrice is set by the tokens that trade today. Supply analysis is about the ones that will trade tomorrow, and who holds them.Advanced12 min readOnchain analysis16Query the chain yourself: SQL for onchain questionsEvery dashboard answers somebody else's question. With a little SQL you can answer your own, straight from the chain.Advanced12 min readOnchain analysis
The ladder

Four levels, one path

Move up when this level feels easy, or step down a level whenever a guide leans on something you have not met yet. There is no penalty for either.

Level 1

Beginner

Never used crypto, or used it without being sure what was happening.

29 guidesOpen BeginnerLevel 2

Intermediate

You hold crypto in your own wallet and you have made a swap. Now make it work for you.

16 guidesOpen IntermediateLevel 3You are here

Advanced

For active DeFi users and traders who want the mechanics, not the marketing.

16 guidesThis levelLevel 4

Expert

For builders, researchers and auditors who want to reason from first principles.

16 guidesOpen Expert

Start the Advanced level

Sixteen guides, about 3 hours of reading, and every one of them free. Your progress stays on this device.

Read guide oneBack to Intermediate
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