Bitcoin Brent crude oil prices briefly fell below $80,000 on Thursday night after the United States launched a new round of air strikes on Iran, causing Brent crude oil to briefly exceed $100 a barrel before giving up some of its gains during the Asian and European sessions.
Strategy Chairman Michael Saylor said that the company will consider selling Bitcoin to pay STRC’s dividends, which is a significant departure from its previous “never sell” strategy, and the crypto market is already somewhat nervous.
Ethereum (ETH) is trading at $2,280, down 0.2% since midnight UTC, and is down around 2% in the past 24 hours, with other altcoins such as Monero (XMR) and Dash (DASH) falling between 4% and 5%.
The broader cryptocurrency recovery remains intact, with Bitcoin rebounding from $65,000 in late March, but it is worth noting that a fall below $75,000 would offset a recent series of higher lows and signal a return to previous trading ranges.
Derivatives positioning
- The cryptocurrency futures market cooled for the second day in a row, with cumulative industry notional open interest falling by more than 1.5% to $131.5 billion, and trading volume falling by more than 12% to $191 billion. Investors are apparently deleveraging after Bitcoin fell below $80,000 overnight.
- Nearly $300 million in bets were liquidated on the exchange in 24 hours, with bulls accounting for the majority. This suggests traders were prepared to continue price gains over the weekend, only to bear the brunt of unexpected market weakness.
- Open interest (OI) fell across most major coins, including Bitcoin and Ethereum. The OI of meme token DOGE dropped by more than 4%, the largest drop among the top 10 tokens. TON performed the most outstandingly, with OI increasing by 6%.
- For the second day in a row, OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta remained negative for most major currencies, suggesting traders were actively shorting using market orders rather than passive limit orders.
- On Deribit, the most actively traded contract in the past 24 hours was the BTC $105,000 call option expiring on June 26. Market positioning has also changed, with the top five contracts by volume now including puts with strike prices of $80,000, $75,000 and $60,000. This marks a marked change from the previous three sessions, where call options dominated trading activity.
- Bitcoin’s annualized 30-day implied volatility index BVIV remains near 40%, its lowest level since late January, a sign of market calm ahead of the key U.S. non-farm payrolls report.
token talk
- Despite relative weakness among major cryptocurrencies and privacy coins, CoinDesk’s DeFi Select Index (DFX) has surged more than 3% since midnight UTC, driven by an 8.2% rise in ONDO’s price.
- Ondo Finance, a real-world asset (RWA) project, completed the first cross-border cross-bank redemption of U.S. Treasuries on Thursday in partnership with JPMorgan Chase, Mastercard and Ripple, driving price gains over the past 24 hours into Friday.
- The CoinDesk Memecoin Select Index (CDMEME) fell on Friday, falling 0.1%, making it the only CoinDesk benchmark to post a loss.
- CoinMarketCap’s “Altcoin Season” indicator is at 42/100, which is significantly higher than April’s low of 31/100. During this period, the total market capitalization of altcoins has risen from under $1 trillion to $1.05 trillion.
