Bitcoin The price drop has changed the market mood, and bets on it are falling even further now, as hot as moonshots above $100,000.
The leading cryptocurrency by market value has fallen almost 10% this week, hitting nine-month lows below $78,000, according to data from CoinDesk. The price crash has traders looking for put options, those derivative contracts that protect against a possible decline in bitcoin, just like health insurance covers you if you get sick.
The result: the dollar value of the number of active bitcoin put option contracts at the $75,000 level listed on Deribit now stands at $1.159 billion, almost matching the so-called notional open interest of $1.168 million locked in the $100,000 call option. Deribit is the world’s largest crypto options exchange by volume and open interest, with one contract representing 1 BTC.
In other words, the $75,000 put option, which represents a bet that the spot price of bitcoin will fall below that level, is as popular as the $100,000 call option, which has been a dominant play for weeks. The latter is a bet that prices will rise to six figures.
“[There has been a] massive increase in put option buying in the last 48 hours (sensitivity at its peak), just as the BTC spot price fell from 88k to 75k. Options traders/hedges/funds had these exact price ranges targeted with clear guides,” pseudonymous observer GravitySucks said in an X post.
While the $75,000 put is the most popular bearish play, significant open interest is also seen in puts with strike prices of $70,000, $80,000, and $85,000, while calls with higher strike prices, except for the $100,000, lack similar activity.
This contrasts sharply with the pattern since President Donald Trump’s victory, where higher strike calls consistently attracted more interest than lower strike calls. The former bullish positioning likely arose from the hope that valuations would rise if Trump followed through on his campaign promises to regulate cryptocurrencies.
While the Trump administration delivered on much of that promise, BTC’s price rally still fizzled out above $120,000 in early October and has been falling ever since. Beyond macroeconomic pressures, the delay in the cryptocurrency market structure bill has likely increased frustration.
