Bitcoin remained stalled on Tuesday, falling for the first time this month and breaking the longest winning streak since March. It reached $64,500, its highest level in more than two weeks, on Monday.
Ether (ETH) followed the largest cryptocurrency, falling to $1,770 after hitting a high of $1,830 on Monday.
July’s rally can be attributed to a short-squeeze pattern identified in late June, which saw strong short-term interest despite bitcoin trading at its lowest level since 2024.
Bitcoin and other crypto tokens have benefited from a bias in short positions, recovering from oversold territory and moving higher each day since the start of the month.
The total crypto market has grown 8.4% since July 1 and is now worth $2.16 trillion.
US stocks fell in pre-market trading on Tuesday, with Nasdaq 100 Index futures losing 0.9% since midnight UTC as the decline from June’s record high continues.
Positioning of derivative products
- More than $500 million in leveraged cryptocurrency futures bets were liquidated by exchanges in 24 hours, with short or bearish positions accounting for most of the total for a sixth straight day.
- Despite recent price strength, BTC futures open interest (OI) slipped to 740,000 BTC, down from the July 3 high of 776,000 BTC. This shows that derivatives traders are not participating in the price rise, alongside continued weakness in spot demand, as evidenced by ETF flows and Coinbase premium. This raises questions about the sustainability of the gains.
- The same goes for Ether (ETH), which has recently outperformed BTC.
- OI in SOL has returned to 68 million tokens from the high of over 76 million on June 24. The message is the same. The token’s 10% rise has so far failed to galvanize demand for leveraged games.
- Canton Network’s CC token declined by more than 4% in 24 hours, accompanied by a 3% rise in OI futures to 245.59 million tokens. This, coupled with negative funding rates and a 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta, indicates a growing bearish bias.
- Most tokens have negative OI-adjusted CVD, a sign that bears are more aggressive in shorting market orders rather than playing with passive limit orders. This suggests potential for future losses.
- Bitcoin’s 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, jumped to 40%, ending a six-day losing streak. Nonetheless, the gauge remains well below January highs near 60%, which is a positive sign for crypto bulls. The same goes for the ether index, EVIV.
- On Deribit, options continue to show persistent bearish concerns regarding bitcoin and ether. BTC options volume paints a mixed picture for both calls and places it on the list of most traded bets over the past 24 hours.
- On decentralized exchange Derive, a large long-buy condor strategy on HYPE broke the band, indicating expectations for play between $75 and $80 through July 24.
Symbolic discussion
- The altcoin market continues to present internal contradictions. Tokens like FET, KASPA, and WLD all posted losses despite the broader market rally this week, while ETHFI and LIT outperformed, adding more than 30% over the past seven days.
- was one of the best performing tokens on Tuesday, rising 4.8. Note that the token, linked to the family of President Donald Trump, is down more than 89% since its creation last August.
- The decoupling of certain altcoins demonstrates a maturation of the sector, with token performance based on underlying sentiment and on-chain activity. Historically, the entire altcoin market moved in unison.
- CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season Indicator is at 46/100, below Friday’s high and higher than May’s, when it was consistently around 30/100.
