How Up / Down markets resolve

Each round asks a single question: will the BTC/USD index price be higher 60 seconds from now?

A round opens exactly on the minute. The index price at that instant is recorded as the open price (shown as "Opened at" on the market page). Sixty seconds later the index is read again — the close price — and the two are compared.

Resolution is automatic and instant. There is no human judgment, review window, or appeal — the two index prints are the only inputs.

Both prints come from Omnibook's BTC/USD reference index: a volume-weighted composite of major spot exchanges, updated four times per second. Using a composite rather than a single exchange means no one venue's glitch, outage, or wick can decide a round.

If an exchange feed goes stale for more than two seconds it is dropped from the composite until it recovers. The index value shown live on the market page is the same value used for resolution — what you see is what settles.

Every contract settles at $1.00 or $0.00. When the clock hits zero, winning contracts are credited $1.00 each to your balance immediately; losing contracts expire worthless.

Because Up and Down are two sides of the same contract, their prices always sum to 100¢ — a Down contract always costs 100¢ minus the Up price.

Unfilled limit orders are cancelled at round close and the reserved funds refunded in full. Orders never roll into the next round.

Trading locks in the final 3 seconds of each round. No new positions or orders can be placed during the lock; open positions simply ride to resolution.

A round is voided only if the reference index cannot produce a valid print at open or close — for example, if every constituent exchange feed is down simultaneously. In a voided round all trades are unwound: every participant gets back exactly what they paid, and no contracts settle. Voided rounds are expected to be extremely rare.