Docs
Glossary
The words this site uses, in plain terms.
- Clarification
- Text a venue adds to a market's rules to settle a case the rules didn't cover. Polymarket posts them under "Additional context" and clears the order book when it does. A clarification can change who gets paid even when it's described as an explanation.
- Rules edit
- Any change to the rules text that isn't labeled a clarification: a rewritten sentence, a removed condition, a new threshold.
- Resolution source
- The website, agency or data feed a market names as the authority for its outcome, like the AP for an election call. Changing it can change the answer.
- End date and close time
- When trading stops. On Polymarket the end date is a target and resolution can come later; on Kalshi the close time ends trading and the expiration time is the last moment the outcome can be decided.
- UMA
- The oracle Polymarket uses to settle markets. Anyone can propose an outcome by posting a bond; anyone can dispute it by posting a matching bond.
- Proposal
- The first step of settling a Polymarket market: someone tells UMA's oracle which outcome happened. RulesWatch records these as routine unless they're disputed.
- Liveness
- The challenge window after a proposal, two hours by default on Polymarket. If nobody disputes during liveness, the proposal stands.
- Dispute
- A challenge to a proposed outcome. The first dispute resets the proposal; a second one goes to a vote of UMA token holders, which takes about two days.
- Settlement
- When the market pays out. On Kalshi, the outcome is determined first, then settled after a short timer unless someone disputes it.
- Determination
- Kalshi's decision on a market's outcome, made after the market closes. It can be amended after review.
- Edit window
- On RulesWatch, the time between my last check that saw the old text and the check that found the new text. The edit happened inside it.
- Value filled in
- A template value written into the rules when a market opens, like the target price of a 15-minute Bitcoin market. Routine, so it's left out of the default feed.
- Event
- A group of related markets, like every candidate in one race. The same clarification often lands on all of them at once.
- Yes price
- The price of a Yes share in cents, which reads as the market's probability. 62¢ means the market gives it about a 62% chance.