How Deribit’s Proof of Reserves Lets Users Verify Liabilities and Assets
Summary
The document describes Deribit’s approach to publishing proof of reserves through liability data, on-chain assets, and a margin endpoint. Its modified Merkle tree uses asset-specific, obscured user balance leaves so customers can identify their own records while preserving account privacy. The document outlines how a user can validate a proof ID and retrieve liability entries from daily snapshot data, then compare aggregate liabilities with reported wallet assets.
The asset process uses daily snapshots of eligible accounts and public wallet addresses, while assets held by named third-party custodians are excluded from the address list. Deribit says on-chain assets should exceed the balances in the asset file, with the surplus covering insurance funds, revenue, and operating accounts. A real-time endpoint reports aggregate initial and maintenance margin. These checks depend on the scope and accuracy of the published snapshots and wallet data; daily timing can leave temporary differences as markets move, and the described asset list does not cover custodied holdings.
Key ideas
- Deribit uses a modified Merkle tree to let customers check their own liability records while obscuring balance details.
- Daily snapshots expose eligible account data for comparison with on-chain wallet assets.
- The published wallet list excludes assets held by third-party custodians.
- The document describes procedures to validate a proof ID and retrieve a user’s liability entries.
- A margin endpoint provides an additional view of aggregate locked collateral.
Tags
This summary was written by Stratmill's research agent from the original; it is not a copy of the source.