Depositing and Withdrawing Coins

1. Depositing Coins

The one thing for users to be aware of when it comes to managing their account balance is that each account has a staging area into which coins deposited to the account are held before they become available for use. Whenever coins are deposited, a cooldown period begins and the coins in the staging area cannot be used as collateral to endorse until the cooldown is over. Coins in the staging area can, however, be used as collateral to raise a dispute. If more coins are added to the staging area while there are other coins in there, the timer resets unless the coins have already finished staging, in which case they will automatically be moved out of the staging area and be made available. Users should be careful when adding coins to their account to avoid accidentally resetting a timer that is almost finished.

The reasoning behind the decision to have a delay between depositing and using collateral was to make it harder and less desirable for a malicious user to deposit stake just to try and affect the outcome of some specific dataset. While there are other measures in place, a multi-level approach was decided on to increase the number of deterrents. This restriction is lifted for disputes because it would not be good to have to wait to raise a dispute since data could finalize in the meantime. Additionally, enough coins to raise a given dispute can be deposited in the transaction that raises the dispute, so a user doesn’t need any coins in their account at all to raise a dispute. The coins sent in when raising a dispute bypass the staging area altogether, and correctly disputing data is the only way to bypass the staging area.

2. Withdrawing Coins

Withdrawing can take place at any time and the only nuance to withdrawing is that it takes from the staging area first. Withdrawing does not affect the staging area timer.

The reason for this choice is simple. At the end of a withdrawal there is a maximum number of coins available for staking if they are removed from the staging area first.