Crypto Prices Stabilize as Derivatives Indicate Unwinding of Long Positions
Major cryptocurrencies exhibited little movement amid stable U.S. stock index futures, despite positive outcomes from the meeting involving European leaders, President Trump, and Ukraine's President Zelensky.
The top 10 cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin and Ethereum, initially fell before recovering to flat trading over a 24-hour period. The CoinDesk 20 index rose by 0.5%, while the CoinDesk 80 Index saw minimal increases. Conversely, the CoinDesk Memecoin index decreased by 0.3%. Select tokens like Mantle Network's MNT and HASH recorded double-digit price gains.
Derivatives Positioning
- BTC's retest of $115,000 led to a drop in cumulative open interest for USDT perpetual futures to 214,000 BTC, the lowest in over a week.
- This suggests that the price decline resulted from unwinding long positions rather than new short positions.
- ETH experienced an increase in open interest above 5 million ETH, indicating new short positions.
- Open interest in the top 10 tokens, excluding ETH and BNB, declined over the past 24 hours.
- MNT token gained nearly 14% in 24 hours, but bearish funding rates emerged alongside increased open interest.
- On the CME, BTC standard futures remain light, with annualized three-month basis below 10%. ETH's open interest rose to 1.83 million, signaling renewed capital inflows.
- ETH CME options open interest surpassed 200,000 ETH for the first time since September, reflecting heightened interest in hedging.
- BTC puts at November expiry traded at a premium to calls on Deribit, signaling concerns about potential price drops.
- Notable long positions in BTC and ETH puts were identified via OTC network Paradigm.
Token Talk
- Starknet's v0.14.0 upgrade introduces a multi-sequencer setup, enhancing decentralization and transaction throughput.
- The release features a pre-confirmation system and an EIP-1559-inspired fee model, with a brief mainnet outage expected during rollout.
- Future versions aim to further decentralize sequencers and provers, impacting Starknet’s STRK token dynamics.
- Solana's DeFi TVL increased by 30.4% to $8.6 billion, largely due to Kamino’s contribution, making it the second-largest network by DeFi activity.
- Spot DEX volumes declined by 45% to $2.5 billion, while stablecoin supply dropped 17% to $10.3 billion. USDC’s market share decreased to 69%.
- Liquid staking participation rose to 12.2% of SOL’s supply, boosting staked value to $60 billion and enhancing DeFi yields.