The end of another week is upon us again, which means another batch of Bitcoin and Ethereum options contracts are expiring as spot markets cool from recent rallies.
Around 103,500 Bitcoin options contracts will expire on Friday, July 25, and they have a notional value of roughly $12.6 billion.
This one is much larger than last week’s expiry, being an end-of-month event, but unlikely to be enough to influence spot markets, which have been on the back foot for most of the week.
“Last month’s H1 expiry hit $17 billion. This week is not far behind, with over $15 billion in BTC and ETH options expiring,” observed Deribit.
This week’s big batch of Bitcoin options contracts has a put/call ratio of 0.88, meaning that there are more calls expiring than put contracts. There is also a max pain point of $112,000, around $4,000 below current spot prices, which is where most losses will be made on contract expiry.
Open interest (OI), or the value or number of BTC options contracts yet to expire, is highest at $140,000, which has surged to over $3 billion at this strike price. There is also more than $2 billion OI at $120,000 and $130,000 strike prices as the bull speculators load up on contracts.
“The group shows a predominantly bearish sentiment with traders holding put positions despite significant losses.”
Most traders are focused on “potential downward moves, with key discussion around volatility levels around 30%,” it stated before adding, “Despite 90% losses on put positions, traders are doubling down with suggestions to ‘sell more’ rather than cutting losses.”
In addition to today’s batch of Bitcoin options, there are around 733,000 Ethereum contracts that are also expiring, with a notional value of $2.75 billion, a max pain point of $2,800, and a put/call ratio of 0.87. This brings Friday’s combined crypto options expiry notional value to around $15.4 billion.
Crypto markets have started to tank as the week comes to an end, with total capitalization dumping $100 billion in 12 hours in a fall to $3.87 trillion.
Bitcoin led the losses, dumping 3% over the past few hours to drop below $116,000 during the Friday morning Asian trading session. The asset had fallen to a two-week low of $115,750 at the time of writing and didn’t look like it was going to stop there.
Ethereum had dipped below $3,600 again, but it appeared to be holding up a little better than its big brother.
Altseason hopes have been quashed again with altcoins bleeding out and larger losses for Solana, Dogecoin, and Hyperliquid.
