Shielded intents
The unit of work: an encrypted trade intent bound to a note commitment.
A shielded intent is a tuple (sell, buy, amount, minOut, deadline, recipient) encrypted to the settlement circuit's public key and bound to a note commitment cm. The wallet produces a Halo 2 proof that the intent is well-formed and funded without revealing any of its fields.
Lifecycle
| Step | Provable / public | Hidden |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Construct | Nothing | All intent fields, wallet balance |
| 2. Commit | cm, proof of well-formedness, fee bond | Assets, amounts, recipient |
| 3. Auction | Encrypted bids, bid count | Route candidates, prices |
| 4. Settle | Nullifier nf, net state transition | Intermediate hops, link to sender |
The intent expires at deadline; an unfilled intent's note can be reclaimed by revealing its nullifier through a refund path, which is indistinguishable from a filled one to outside observers.