bitcoin fell below $80,000 on Thursday night after the United States launched new airstrikes on Iran, sending Brent crude oil briefly above $100 a barrel before giving up some of the gains during Asian and European hours.
The cryptocurrency market was already a little nervous after Chief Strategy Officer Michael Saylor said the company would consider selling bitcoin to cover its STRC dividend payments, a U-turn from its previous “never sell” strategy.
Ether (ETH) is trading at $2,280, having lost 0.2% since midnight UTC and around 2% in the last 24 hours, while other altcoins such as monero (XMR) and dash (DASH) have lost between 4% and 5%.
The broader cryptocurrency recovery remains intact, as Bitcoin rebounded from $65,000 in late March, although it is worth noting that a drop below $75,000 would nullify the recent series of higher lows and signal a reversal to the previous trading range.
Derivatives positioning
- The cryptocurrency futures market has cooled for the second day in a row, with industry cumulative theoretical open interest falling more than 1.5% to $131.5 billion and trading volume down more than 12% to $191 billion. Investors are clearly deleveraging following bitcoin’s overnight drop below $80,000.
- Exchanges have liquidated nearly $300 million in bets in 24 hours, with long positions accounting for most of the total. It shows that traders were positioned to continue pushing prices higher over the weekend, only to take the brunt of the unexpected market weakness.
- Open interest (OI) has decreased on most major tokens, including bitcoin and ether. The OI of the Meme token DOGE has fallen more than 4%, the most among the top 10 coins. TON is the most notable, with an OI that increased by 6%.
- For the second day in a row, the OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta for most major companies remains negative, a sign that traders are selling aggressively using market orders instead of passive limit orders.
- On Deribit, the most actively traded contract in the last 24 hours was a $105,000 BTC call option expiring on June 26. Market positioning has also changed, and the five most traded contracts now include puts at $80,000, $75,000 and $60,000. This marks a clear change from the previous three sessions, when calls dominated trading activity.
- Bitcoin’s 30-day annualized implied volatility index, BVIV, remains near 40%, the lowest since late January, a sign of calm in the market ahead of the important US nonfarm payrolls report.
symbolic talk
- Despite the relative weakness of major cryptocurrencies and privacy coins, CoinDesk’s DeFi Select Index (DFX) is up more than 3% since midnight UTC, driven by an 8.2% gain in ONDO price.
- Ondo Finance is a real-world asset (RWA) project that on Thursday completed its first cross-border redemption of US Treasuries after having worked with JP Morgan, Mastercard and Ripple, driving price appreciation in the last 24 hours through Friday.
- The CoinDesk Memecoin Select Index (CDMEME) lost ground on Friday, posting a 0.1% swing lower to make it the only CoinDesk benchmark in the red.
- CoinMarketCap’s “altcoin season” indicator is at 42/100, significantly higher than in April, when it was as low as 31/100. The total market capitalization of altcoins during that period has increased from less than $1 trillion to $1.05 trillion.
