bitcoin stalled on Tuesday, falling for the first time this month and snapping the longest winning streak since March. On Monday it had risen to $64,500, its highest point in more than two weeks.
Ether (ETH) followed the largest cryptocurrency, falling to $1,770 after reaching a high of $1,830 on Monday.
The July rally can be attributed to a short squeeze setup that was identified in late June, which generated huge short interest even though bitcoin trading was at its lowest point since 2024.
Bitcoin and other crypto tokens capitalized on a bias in short positions, recovering from oversold territory and advancing every day since the beginning of the month.
The total crypto market has grown by 8.4% since July 1 and is now worth $2.16 trillion.
U.S. stocks fell in premarket trading on Tuesday, with Nasdaq 100 index futures losing 0.9% as of midnight UTC as the slide from June’s all-time high continues.
Derivatives positioning
- Exchanges have liquidated more than $500 million in leveraged crypto futures bets in 24 hours, with short or bearish positions accounting for the majority of the total for the sixth day in a row.
- Despite recent price strength, BTC futures open interest (OI) has fallen to 740,000 BTC, below the July 3 high of 776,000 BTC. This shows that derivatives traders are not participating in the price increase along with continued weakness in spot demand, as evidenced by ETF flows and Coinbase premium. This raises questions about the sustainability of the profits.
- The same goes for ether (ETH), which recently outperformed BTC.
- OI on SOL has retreated to 68 million tokens from the high of over 76 million on June 24. The message is the same. So far, the 10% rise in the token has failed to galvanize demand for leveraged plays.
- Canton Network’s CC token is down more than 4% in 24 hours, accompanied by a 3% rise in OI futures to 245.59 million tokens. This, coupled with negative funding rates and the 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta, points to a growing bearish bias.
- Most tokens have a negative OI-adjusted CVD, a sign that bears are more aggressive in shorting market orders rather than playing passive limit orders. Suggests possibilities of future losses.
- Bitcoin’s 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, has jumped to 40%, snapping a six-day losing streak. Still, the indicator remains well below January highs, close to 60%, which is a positive sign for cryptocurrency bulls. The same goes for the ether index, EVIV.
- On Deribit, options continue to show lingering bearish concerns in both bitcoin and ether. The volume of options in BTC shows a mixed picture with both call options and places it on the list of the most traded bets in the last 24 hours.
- On decentralized exchange Derive, a large condor long buy strategy on HYPE crossed the ribbon, indicating expectations of a play range between $75 and $80 through July 24.
symbolic talk
- The altcoin market continues to show internal contradictions. Tokens like FET, KASPA, and WLD have posted losses despite the broader market-wide rally this week, while ETHFI and LIT have fared better, adding more than 30% in the past seven days.
- was one of the top-performing tokens on Tuesday, rising 4.8. It is worth noting that the token, linked to President Donald Trump’s family, is down more than 89% since its creation last August.
- The decoupling of some altcoins demonstrates a maturity of the sector, with token performance based on underlying sentiment and on-chain activity. Historically, the entire altcoin market moved in unison.
- CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season indicator is at 46/100, below Friday’s high and higher than in May, when it was consistently around 30/100.
