The crypto market enters the final stretch of the month in a dangerous position with bitcoin still below $60,000 and ether (ETH) below $1,600.
The price of bitcoin has now lost more than 50% of its value since October’s all-time high, and analysts suggest more downside lies ahead in the coming months.
On Monday, the largest cryptocurrency is marginally in the black, rising 0.6% since midnight UTC to $59,800 despite the broader market structure and chart formation tilting bearish.
Solana (SOL) has recovered after falling to its lowest point since late 2023 earlier this month. It has advanced more than 13% since Thursday and 2% since midnight.
US stocks rose overnight, as Nasdaq 100 futures rose 1%, while S&P 500 futures added 0.75%. Both indices remain in a downward trend since reaching all-time highs on June 15.
Derivatives positioning
- More than $200 million in futures positions have been closed or forcibly liquidated by exchanges in the past 24 hours, with long positions accounting for the majority of the amount.
- There are signs of a turnaround in the past four hours: The nearly $20 million in liquidations included $13 million in short positions. That shows how BTC’s bounce to $60,000 took some bears by surprise.
- The BTC futures market offers little excitement. Open interest (OI) has returned to the ranges seen earlier this month, erasing the small increase to 775K BTC seen on Friday. Traders seem less willing to take risks.
- The same goes for ether, where OI remains locked at around 14.2 million ETH.
- Open interest positioning in SOL feels relatively elevated at 72.70 million SOL, just below the record of over 76 million SOL set on June 24. That suggests potential for higher volatility in the native Solana token.
- AVAX rose more than 5% last week, decoupling from weakness in market leader BTC. But that hasn’t been enough to entice traders to make leveraged bets. OI continues to fall, settling at 38.07 million tokens, the lowest level since April 1. That raises questions about the sustainability of the price gains.
- The 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta (CVD) remains bearish. Most of the top 25 tokens except TRX, XMR, and ZEC are showing negative values, a sign that the bears are leading the price action by selling through market orders rather than limit orders.
- However, volatility indices offer good news. The BVIV, which tracks BTC’s 30-day implied volatility, fell between 5% and 47% today, halting its two-week rally. That suggests a renewed commitment to market calm, a typical feature of sharp increases in spot prices.
- On Deribit, BTC and ETH options continue to show a bias towards short put or protection options. In the case of BTC, the $60,000 put now has a theoretical open interest of almost $1 billion, almost rivaling the $1.11 billion found in the $80,000 call. These two have been key option levels for at least two months. If prices fall below $60,000, the next large group of options is at $50,000, with a notional OI of $712 million.
- Over the weekend, traders sold strangles expiring July 10 on HYPE options on the decentralized platform Derive, according to data tracked by Laevitas. Shorting a choke is a bet on price consolidation.
symbolic talk
- The altcoin market is little changed and is trading in line with the largest cryptocurrencies, while traders seem apathetic towards more speculative assets until bitcoin confirms its next move.
- Privacy coins Dash (DASH) and Zcash (ZEC) rose more than 2% on Monday. The move comes after both assets lost between 18% and 30% in the last two weeks alone, suggesting this is more of a relief rally than a meaningful recovery.
- lost 1.5% since midnight, joining AI token FET in the red.
- CoinMarketCap’s “Altcoin Season” indicator is at 49/100, a level it has held for most of June as investors focus on bitcoin’s next move.
