Reading the numbers

Why a dash is not a failure, why nothing here rounds toward the flattering answer, and what each stamp on a figure means.

A dash means unknown. It never means zero.

Every rate on a DeVOLT screen is either measured or absent. When a yield cannot be resolved the figure that depends on it renders as an em dash, and the figures around it do not quietly fill the gap with a zero.

A dash

not measured

Something the figure depends on could not be read, so nothing at all is claimed about it.

It never stands in for a small number, and it never stands in for nothing.

The figures around it do not quietly fill the gap it leaves.

A zero

a measurement

A real reading that came back as nothing, which is a fact about the market.

Written in place of a missing cost, it understates the debt by a multiple under leverage.

On screen it cannot be told from a measurement, because that is exactly what it claims to be.

The distinction is the whole chapter. The expensive direction is also the flattering one: a cost nobody measured, written as though it were nothing, reads as the best possible number and nothing on the screen says otherwise.

Unknown never blocks either

The mirror of the rule matters as much. Refusing a market because of a condition nobody checked is the same defect as asserting one, and it is the more expensive direction, because it hides something that works. A gate fires on a measured value or it does not fire.

When a check could not run at all, the number built on it says so out loud. A count that depends on an unread condition is not presented as a fact. The markets table’s Borrow tab, for instance, states which chains had their borrow-side incentives read and says that the costs on the rest are gross, because an unread incentive makes debt look dearer than it is.

Every figure carries its moment

A balance is a fact about a point in time. Anything computed from live data on these surfaces carries a measured-at stamp: relative in the open, exact on hover. A stamp that has gone stale changes colour rather than sitting quietly.

The marks you will see

—: Not measured. Not zero, not small, but unknown.
*: A measured borrow-side incentive has been subtracted from this cost.
⚠: The number is real and something about it is unusual. Hovering says what.
before incentives: The incentive read for this chain did not happen, so the cost shown is gross and is a ceiling, not a measurement.