By Francisco Rodrigues (All times Eastern Time unless otherwise noted)
bitcoin hovers around $113,000 after falling 1.4% in 24 hours, while the broader crypto market, measured via the CoinDesk 20 Index (CD20), fell 2%.
The declines come amid a rotation toward stablecoins ahead of the Federal Reserve’s policy decision later today. An interest rate cut of 25 basis points is almost a certainty. The CME FedWatch tool shows a 99.9% chance of this happening, while Polymarket traders put the odds at 98.1%.
Traders are also watching for signs that the Federal Reserve is willing to slow the liquidation of its balance sheets, which would further ease financial conditions and be a potential boon for risk assets.
Commercial activity has decreased. Liquidity on centralized exchanges has fallen sharply, with order book depth at just 40% of pre-settlement levels, according to Foresight Ventures, as traders rotate toward stablecoins.
“Traders are shifting towards dollar stablecoins and concentrating liquidity in deep order books,” OKX Singapore CEO Gracie Lin told CoinDesk. According to Wintermute, stablecoin supply is rising again for the first time since September, showing that “macro tailwinds are starting to translate into new inflows.”
Similarly, perpetual futures funding rates are now back positive for most major tokens, while open interest for BTC and ETH is “rebuilding at a measured pace.”
“While Uptober got off to a bit of a false start, macro tailwinds, cooling inflation, ‘stabilization’ of geopolitical tension, and a dovish FED are setting the stage for a favorable rest of the year, which historically (the fourth quarter) has been the strongest for bitcoin,” wrote Wintermute OTC Desk Strategist Jasper De Maere.
Positioning and macroeconomic tailwinds seem to suggest a breakout is coming, a position several analysts appear to be taking. However, President Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping later this week could add to the uncertainty. Stay alert!
What to watch
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Crypto
- October 29: Grayscale’s Solana Trust becomes a spot ETF listed on NYSE Arca under the symbol GSOL.
- Macro
- October 29, 9:45 am: Bank of Canada interest rate decision. Policy interest rate (previously 2.5%). The press conference begins 45 minutes later; see live
- October 29, 2:00 p.m.: Federal Reserve interest rate decision. Fed funds rate target range Est. 3.75%-4%. The press conference begins 30 minutes later; see live
- Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)
symbolic events
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Governance votes and calls
- Lisk DAO is voting on a 4 million LSK proposal to start a Lisk DAO fund, replacing grants with investments in top Lisk startups. Voting ends on October 29.
- ZKsync DAO is voting on allocating ZK33 million (~$1.65 million) to the ZKsync Association to maintain and improve governance infrastructure until 2026. Voting ends on October 29.
- ENS DAO is voting to fund ENS Contract Naming Season, a six-month program led by Enscribe with 75,000 USDC and 10,000 ENS to promote smart contract naming, drive ENS adoption, and improve Ethereum UX. Voting ends on October 29.
- Unlock
- Token releases
Conferences
For a more complete list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
symbolic talk
By Oliver Knight
- The altcoin market began showing signs of strength on Wednesday, with traders shifting towards higher beta tokens ahead of potential political headlines.
- The TRUMP token, touted by President Donald Trump in January, led the charge, rallying as optimism grew that the United States and China are moving closer to a trade deal.
- also increased, driven by continued activity in Base-based DeFi protocols. The token added 7.2% and reached its highest level since the beginning of the month.
- The market still showed a preference for bitcoin, and CoinMarketCap’s “altcoin season” indicator remained at 26/100.
- Altcoin gains were limited to memecoins and DeFi tokens, while larger tokens traded in tight ranges.
- and hedera (HBAR) gave back much of their gains on Wednesday: the former fell 6.9% in 24 hours, while hedera fell 4.5% even though a spot HBAR ETF went live on the NYSE on Tuesday.
Derivatives positioning
- The BTC futures market remains stable, with open interest (OI) of $26.8 billion.
- However, the funding rates are highly divergent: Deribit shows an aggressive rise to 24.64% annualized, indicating strong demand for long positions, while OKX fell to -3%, where short positions are paid out.
- This combination of sustained high OI and polarized funding rates indicates elevated near-term market volatility and uncertainty, disrupting previously consistent bullish sentiment.
- In the options market, Bitcoin is showing a sharp increase in bullish conviction. The term structure of implied volatility (IV) shows a slight short-term pullback (downward slope) before normalizing into a long-term contango (upward slope).
- Short-term bullish sentiment has increased significantly, with the 250 delta bias at 10% by one-week expiry, meaning traders are paying a substantial premium for call options. This is further validated by the 24-hour sales call volume, which strongly favors calls (60%).
- Coinglass data shows $514 million in 24-hour liquidations, with a 69-31 split between long and short positions. ETH ($155 million), BTC ($114 million), and SOL ($57 million) were the leaders in terms of notional settlements.
- The Binance settlement heatmap indicates $114,350 as the central settlement level to monitor, in case of a price increase.
Market movements
- BTC is up 0.23% since 4 pm ET on Tuesday to $113,094.99 (24 hours: -1.34%)
- ETH is up 0.53% to $4,003 (24 hours: -2.87%)
- CoinDesk 20 rose 0.72% to 3,755.92 (24 hours: -2.03%)
- Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate is down 4 basis points to 2.85%
- BTC funding rate is 0.0036% (3.9431% annualized) on Binance
- DXY rises 0.21% to 98.88
- Gold futures rise 1.35% to $4,036.70
- Silver futures rise 2.21% to $48.37
- The Nikkei 225 closed up 2.17% at 51,307.65
- Hang Seng closed down 0.33% at 26,346.14
- The FTSE rises 0.47% to 9,742.64
- The Euro Stoxx 50 rises 0.27% to 5,719.98
- The DJIA closed Tuesday up 0.34% at 47,706.37
- The S&P 500 closed up 0.23% at 6,890.89
- Nasdaq Composite closed up 0.80% at 23,827.49
- S&P/TSX Composite closed up 0.48% at 30,419.68
- The S&P 40 Latin America closed up 0.86% at 2,979.82
- The 10-year US Treasury rate rises 0.8 basis points to 3.991%
- E-mini S&P 500 futures rise 0.12% to 6,934.00
- E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures rise 0.26% to 26,232.75
- The E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average index fell 0.27% to 47,768.00
Bitcoin Statistics
- BTC dominance: 59.84% (-0.24%)
- Ether-bitcoin ratio: 0.03537 (0.31%)
- Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 1,137 EH/s
- Hashprice (spot): $48.69
- Total fees: 2.94 BTC / $335,834
- CME Futures Open Interest: 143,590 BTC
- BTC priced in gold: 26.9 oz.
- BTC market capitalization against gold: 7.58%
Technical analysis
- The relationship between the total market cap of altcoins (excluding top 10 cryptocurrencies) and bitcoin is based on critical long-term weekly support.
- The lack of a clear signal of revival makes this a very precarious position because a drop below this level would imply significant further decline and market pain for the altcoin sector in general.
- With the next resistance at 36% away and the next support at -27% below, the current risk/reward is unfavorable for broad exposure to altcoins versus bitcoin.
Crypto Stocks
- Coinbase Global (COIN): closed on Tuesday at $355.22 (-1.72%), +0.28% at $356.20 in premarket
- Circle Internet (CRCL): closed at $136.11 (-5.01%), unchanged from the previous market
- Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $37.29 (-8.04%), +0.4% at $37.44
- Bullish (BLSH): closed at $54.01 (-4.08%), +0.54% at $54.30
- MARA Holdings (MARA): closed at $18.88 (-3.48%), +0.58% at $18.99
- Riot Platforms (RIOT): closed at $21.56 (-6.28%), +1.37% at $21.85
- Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $20.09 (+1.11%), +1.54% at $20.40
- CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $19.15 (-5.2%), +1.51% to $19.44
- CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): closed at $59.48 (-2.24%), +0.79% at $59.95
- Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $25.01 (-3.88%)
Crypto treasury companies
- Strategy (MSTR): closed at $284.64 (-3.72%), +0.31% at $285.51
- Semler Scientific (SMLR): closed at $27.22 (-13.42%), +2.87% at $28
- SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $13.74 (-3.98%), -1.38% at $13.55
- Upexi (UPXI): closed at $4.63 (-6.28%), +1.73% at $4.71
- Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $1.93 (-7.66%), +1.04% to $1.95
ETF Flows
BTC Spot ETF
- Daily net flows: $202.4 million
- Accumulated net flows: $62.3 billion
- Total BTC holdings ~1.36 million
ETH Spot ETF
- Daily net flows: $246 million
- Accumulated net flows: $14.75 billion
- Total ETH holdings ~6.75 million
Source: Farside Investors
while you were sleeping
