Reference · Defined Terms
Defined terms.
Plain-language definitions of the key terms used across the platform — its instruments, infrastructure, market functions, regulatory framework, and the minerals it serves. For general reference only; not an offer or investment, legal, or tax advice. Public · last updated June 20, 2026.
Term
Definition
Accredited Investor
An investor that meets the income, net-worth, or professional criteria under Regulation D and is eligible to participate in certain private offerings.
Address
The on-chain location, derived from a public key, that holds and sends tokens.
Allocated
Physical metal or stones specifically identified and segregated as the holder's property, as distinct from an unsegregated (unallocated) claim against a dealer.
Alternative Trading System (ATS)
An SEC-regulated venue that matches buyers and sellers of securities; the form in which the TMINES P2P Exchange operates.
Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining (ASM)
Small-scale, often informal mining; a particular focus of responsible-sourcing and traceability diligence.
Assay
The laboratory analysis that determines the metal content or grade of a sample, bar, or concentrate.
Bailment
The legal relationship in which a custodian (bailee) holds the holder's property for safekeeping without taking title to it.
Best Execution
The obligation to seek the most favorable terms reasonably available when handling a customer order.
Bid / Ask
The highest price a buyer will pay (bid) and the lowest price a seller will accept (ask).
Blockchain
A distributed, append-only ledger of transactions maintained across a network of independent nodes.
Blue Sky Laws
U.S. state securities laws that apply alongside federal securities law.
Bullion
Refined precious metal in bar or ingot form.
Chain of Custody
The documented, unbroken record of an asset's handling and transfer from origin through custody, supporting provenance and responsible-sourcing claims.
Claim Topics Registry
The ERC-3643 component listing the identity claims (such as verified Know Your Customer status or accreditation) a holder must carry to transact.
Clearing
The reconciliation and confirmation of a trade in the interval before settlement.
Collateral Agent
An independent agent that holds and enforces the security interest backing TM Claim Token holders, for their collective benefit.
Compliance Module (Modular Compliance)
The ERC-3643 component that enforces transfer rules — eligibility, limits, and restrictions — at the time of each transaction.
Coupon
A periodic interest payment made on a debt instrument.
Coverage Test
The requirement that pledged collateral value equal at least 1.5 times the outstanding principal of a TM Claim Token series.
Custodian
A third-party, accredited institution that holds the underlying assets — shares or physical metals and stones — backing a token.
Cut-off Grade
The minimum ore grade at which material is economic to mine and process.
Digital Asset
Under Wyoming law (Wyoming Statutes §§ 34-29-101 et seq.), a representation of economic, proprietary, or access rights stored electronically; on the platform, each digital asset is classified by type and treated accordingly.
Digital Security
A digital asset that conveys the legal rights of a security. The TM Claim Token and TM Float Token are digital securities.
Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)
The broader category of shared, synchronized digital ledgers, of which blockchain is one form.
Dividend Pass-Through
The mechanism by which dividends paid on custodied shares are distributed to holders of the corresponding tokens.
Document of Title
An instrument, such as a warehouse receipt, evidencing the holder's right to delivery of identified goods, governed by Uniform Commercial Code Article 7.
Doré
Semi-pure alloy bars produced at a mine site and sent to a refiner for final refining.
Due Diligence
The investigation an investor or the platform conducts into an issuer, project, or asset before investment or onboarding.
EDGAR
The SEC's public electronic system for company and offering filings.
ERC-20
The base fungible-token standard on EVM networks, which the permissioned ERC-3643 standard extends.
ERC-3525
The semi-fungible token standard used for TM Vault Token stones, binding one graded stone to one slot and token identifier.
ERC-3643 (T-REX)
The permissioned security-token standard used across the platform, enforcing identity and transfer compliance on-chain.
Exempt Offering
A securities offering conducted under an exemption from SEC registration.
Feasibility Study
A study assessing the technical and economic viability of a mining project, at preliminary, pre-feasibility, or definitive stages.
Fineness
The purity of a precious metal, expressed in parts per thousand (for example, 995 fine gold).
Form D
The notice an issuer files with the SEC for an offering conducted under Regulation D.
Free Float
The portion of a company's shares available for public trading.
Gas
The fee paid to execute a transaction or smart contract on an EVM network.
General Solicitation
Public advertising of a securities offering, permitted under Rule 506(c) when all purchasers are verified accredited investors.
Grade
The concentration of a target mineral in ore, such as grams per tonne.
Hardware Security Module (HSM)
A tamper-resistant device that generates and safeguards cryptographic keys.
Howey Test
The U.S. Supreme Court test (SEC v. W. J. Howey Co.) for whether an arrangement is an investment contract and therefore a security.
Identity Registry
The ERC-3643 component mapping verified on-chain identities (ONCHAINID) to the addresses permitted to hold a token.
Immutability
The property that confirmed blockchain transactions cannot be altered retroactively.
Issuer
A mining company or project entity that raises capital by issuing tokens on the platform.
Issuer-Tokenized Security
A security tokenized by, or with the authorization of, the issuer of the underlying instrument, so that the token conveys the same legal rights as the underlying.
Layer 1 / Layer 2
A base blockchain network (Layer 1) and a network built atop it for additional scale or speed (Layer 2).
Liquidity
The ease with which an asset can be bought or sold without materially moving its price.
Market Maker
A participant that continuously quotes buy and sell prices to provide liquidity.
Matching Engine
The system that pairs compatible buy and sell orders on a trading venue.
Mineral Resource / Mineral Reserve
An estimated mineral occurrence (resource) and the economically mineable portion of it (reserve), classified under codes such as NI 43-101 or the JORC Code.
Mining Operator
A company that explores, develops, or produces minerals and uses the platform to raise capital or tokenize assets.
Mint / Burn
The creation (mint) and destruction (burn) of tokens by an authorized agent.
Net Asset Value (NAV)
The per-unit value of the assets underlying an instrument.
Net Smelter Return (NSR)
A royalty based on the value of production after deducting refining, smelting, and transport costs.
No-Action Letter
SEC staff guidance stating it would not recommend enforcement against a described course of conduct.
Offtake Agreement
A contract to purchase a project's future production, frequently used to support project financing.
On-Chain / Off-Chain
Recorded on the blockchain (on-chain) versus maintained in external systems (off-chain).
ONCHAINID
The self-sovereign on-chain identity to which verified Know Your Customer and eligibility claims are attached, used across all platform token contracts.
ONCHAINID Compliance Stack
The shared ERC-3643 identity and compliance infrastructure — identity registry, modular compliance, trusted issuers registry, and claim topics registry.
Oracle
A service that delivers external data, such as a price feed, to a smart contract.
Ore
Rock containing minerals in concentrations economic to extract.
Over-the-Counter (OTC)
Trading conducted directly between parties rather than on a centralized exchange.
P2P Exchange
The TMINES peer-to-peer trading function, operated as a registered Alternative Trading System and broker-dealer.
Permissioned Token
A token that can be held or transferred only by addresses whose identity and eligibility have been verified through the compliance stack.
Price Discovery
The process by which market trading establishes an asset's prevailing price.
Primary Market / Secondary Market
The issuance of new securities (primary) versus the trading of already-issued securities (secondary).
Private Key / Public Key
The secret key that controls an on-chain address and the published key that identifies it.
Private Placement Memorandum (PPM)
The disclosure document for a private securities offering.
Project SPV
The special-purpose vehicle holding a single mining project's assets, tenement, and offtake receivables, against which a TM Claim Token is secured.
Proof of Collateral
The continuous, independent attestation that the assets backing a token exist, are allocated or perfected as represented, and remain bankruptcy-remote.
Qualified Institutional Buyer (QIB)
A large institutional investor eligible for certain private resales of securities.
Qualified Person (QP)
The credentialed professional who takes responsibility for a project's technical mineral disclosure.
Real-World Asset (RWA)
A physical or off-chain financial asset represented on-chain by a token.
Record-Date Snapshot
The on-chain capture of token holdings at a set date, used to allocate votes, dividends, and corporate actions.
Refining
Processing raw or doré metal into refined, market-deliverable form.
Regulation Crowdfunding (Reg CF)
The U.S. exemption permitting limited public securities offerings; platform debt offerings made under it carry a tenor of 12 months or less.
Regulation D Rule 506(c)
The U.S. exemption permitting general solicitation of an offering sold only to verified accredited investors.
Regulation S (Reg S)
The U.S. exemption for offers and sales made outside the United States.
Responsible Sourcing
Diligence on the origin and supply chain of metals and stones, consistent with the OECD Gold Supplement, LBMA standards, and the Kimberley Process.
Restricted Security
A security acquired in an unregistered, exempt transaction and subject to resale limits under Rule 144.
Reves Test (Family-Resemblance Test)
The U.S. Supreme Court test (Reves v. Ernst & Young) for whether a note is a security.
Royalty
A right to a percentage of the production, revenue, or value from a project.
Rule 144
The SEC rule governing the resale of restricted securities after a required holding period.
Self-Custody
Holding one's own private keys rather than relying on a third-party custodian.
Self-Regulatory Organization (SRO)
An industry body, such as FINRA, exercising delegated regulatory oversight.
Settlement
The final, irreversible transfer of an asset and its payment that completes a trade.
Settlement Primitive
On the platform, the single uniform settlement action exposed to the matching engine and Transfer Agent across token standards.
Slot (ERC-3525)
The category identifier within a semi-fungible token; on the platform, one graded stone occupies one slot, so distinct stones are never pooled.
Smart Contract
Self-executing code deployed on a blockchain that enforces its rules automatically.
Spread
The difference between the bid and the ask price.
Stablecoin
A token designed to maintain a stable value, typically pegged to a fiat currency.
Streaming
An arrangement to buy a project's future production at a preset price in exchange for upfront capital.
Tenement / Concession
The legal right to explore or mine a defined area.
TM Claim Token (TMCT)
A permissioned digital security representing a fixed-term debt claim secured by a specific mining project's assets and cashflows; holders are secured creditors of the project.
TM Float Token (TMFT)
A permissioned digital security representing a tokenized equity interest backed one-to-one by shares of a mining company held in custody, with share-price exposure, dividend pass-through, and shareholder rights — including voting — passing through to holders.
TM Vault Token (TMVT)
A permissioned token representing direct title to a specific allocated quantity of physical precious metal, or to a graded precious stone, held by a third-party accredited custodian; holders own the underlying asset.
TMINES Platform
The global tokenization platform for mining and mineral assets that lets mining operators raise capital, lets investors invest and conduct due diligence, and lets holders trade on the P2P Exchange.
Tokenization
Representing an asset or right as a transferable on-chain token.
TokenId
The unique on-chain identifier of an individual token; in ERC-3525 it binds a specific graded stone, and its certificate, to a single unit.
Transfer Agent
An SEC-registered transfer agent (Securities Exchange Act of 1934, Section 17A) that maintains the official record of token ownership.
Troy Ounce
The standard unit of weight for precious metals, about 31.103 grams.
Trusted Issuers Registry
The ERC-3643 component listing the parties authorized to issue the identity claims relied on for compliance.
Underwriter
A party that participates in the distribution of securities; relevant to resale and registration analysis.
Voting Pass-Through
The mechanism by which the custodian, as record holder, votes custodied shares solely on the instruction of token holders, allocated by the record-date snapshot.
Wallet
Software or hardware that stores the cryptographic keys controlling on-chain assets.