By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless otherwise noted)
Bitcoin The price rebound sparked optimism on social media, with X users saying the bottom had been reached and a new rally was underway. Options market activity, however, reveals that savvy traders remain skeptical, hedging themselves against the risk of a potential fall below $60,000.
“Although the rebound has triggered some buy buying at the $85,000-$90,000 strikes, the downward trend remains higher than the upward trend, suggesting caution,” Sidrah Fariq, head of retail at Deribit, told CoinDesk in a Telegram conversation.
Demand for call options, or bullish bets, indicates that bitcoin’s rebound Wednesday to $70,000 is spurring some traders to continue higher. However, bias, which measures call prices relative to puts, remains negative across all periods. This shows that traders remain worried about falling prices and are still looking for put options to protect against declines.
Underlying this theme, on Deribit, the $60,000 put remains the most popular position, with a notional open interest (OI) of $1.48 billion. In contrast, the most popular call option, the $90,000 strike option, has an OI of $1.12 billion. Clearly, the overall positioning remains bearish.
That said, there could be some consolidation as broker positioning – the net exposure of those who make the markets by providing liquidity – has turned positive between $60,000 and $70,000. This means traders could buy low and sell high to maintain net neutral exposure, thereby limiting fluctuations.
“Dealer positioning has moved from neutral to slightly positive gamma, suggesting compressed volatility and range-bound price action,” Fariq said.
Other analysts consider the $74,000 to $75,000 range as the level to beat to confirm a new uptrend.
Bitcoin was recently trading near $68,500, up 4.6% on the day, while the broader market saw larger gains, as evidenced by the 5.8% advance in the CoinDesk 20 Index (CD20). Ether (ETH) is up over 8%, and XRP (XRP) and Solana (SOL) are both up over 6%.
In traditional markets, futures contracts linked to the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 were little changed despite AI giant Nvidia (NVDA) releasing a fourth-quarter earnings report. Gold and the dollar index rose as investors awaited details on U.S.-Iran talks scheduled for later in the day. Stay vigilant!
Read more: For analysis of current altcoin and derivatives activity, see Crypto Markets Today
What to watch
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Cryptocurrency
- Macro
- February 26, 8:30 a.m.: first unemployment claims in the United States for the week ending February 21 (previous 206,000)
- February 26, 10:00 a.m.: Michelle Bowman, Fed vice chair for supervision, will testify before the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs.
- Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)
- February 26: American Bitcoin (ABTC), pre-market, $0.01
- February 26: MARA Holdings (MARA), after market, -$0.11
- February 26: TeraWulf (WULF), post-market, -$0.15
- February 26: Figure Technologies (FIGR), post-market, $0.20
- February 26: Sui Group (SUIG), post-market, $0.01
- February 26: Block (XYZ), post-market, $0.49
Token Events
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
- Votes and calls on governance
- February 26: Lido DAO will host a token holder update call.
- February 26: Maple Finance will host an investor call.
- Unlock DAO votes to delegate 2,000,000 PU of the treasury to seven active community members to reliably guarantee quorum on future proposals. Voting closes on February 26.
- Unlocks
- Token Launches
Conferences
For a more comprehensive list of this week’s events, check out CoinDesk’s “Crypto Week Ahead.”
Market movements
- BTC is down 0.52% from 4 p.m. ET Wednesday at $68,590.57 (24 hours: +4.67%)
- ETH is down 1.16% at $2,075.97 (24 hours: +8.36%)
- CoinDesk 20 is down 1.27% at 2,011.66 (24 hours: +5.83%)
- Ether CESR Composite Staking Rate Up 2 Basis Points to 2.85%
- BTC funding rate is 0.0005% (0.5595% annualized) on Binance
- The DXY is unchanged at 97.75
- Gold futures are down 0.41% at $5,204.60
- Silver futures are down 3.98% at $87.99
- The Nikkei 225 closed up 0.29% at 58,753.39
- Hang Seng closed 1.44% lower at 26,381.02
- The FTSE is up 0.17% at 10,824.61
- The Euro Stoxx 50 is up 0.25% at 6,188.91
- DJIA closed Wednesday up 0.63% at 49,482.15
- The S&P 500 closed up 0.81% at 6,946.13
- The Nasdaq Composite closed up 1.26% at 23,152.08
- The S&P/TSX Composite Index closed up 0.46% at 34,127.33
- The S&P 40 Latin America closed up 0.68% at 3,826.41
- The 10-year US Treasury yield rose 0.4 bps to 4.052%
- E-mini S&P 500 futures unchanged at 6,958.75
- E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures unchanged at 25,380.75
- E-mini Dow Jones Industrial Average futures are down 0.13% at 49,471.00
Bitcoin Statistics
- BTC dominance: 58.55% (+0.12%)
- Ether-bitcoin ratio: 0.03023 (-0.12%)
- Hashrate (seven-day moving average): 1,058 EH/s
- Hash price (spot): $29.79
- Total fees: 2.91 BTC / $194,801
- CME Futures Open Interest: 112,135 BTC
- BTC valued in gold: 13.2 ounces.
- BTC vs. gold market capitalization: 4.57%
Technical analysis
- The chart shows weekly Bitcoin price fluctuations in candlestick form since mid-2024.
- Although prices have rebounded strongly this week, they remain well below the $73,000-$74,000 area, which is former support turned resistance.
- The general outlook therefore remains bearish. Prices must overcome this resistance to confirm an upward trend reversal.
Crypto Stocks
- Coinbase Global (COIN): Closed Wednesday at $183.94 (+13.52%), +0.95% to $185.69 in pre-market
- Circle Internet (CRCL): closed at $83.14 (+35.47%), +0.71% to $83.73
- Galaxy Digital (GLXY): closed at $22.83 (+5.99%), +1.40% to $23.15
- Bullish (BLSH): closed at $32.89 (+6.92%), -1.03% at $32.55
- MARA Holdings (MARA): closes at $8.57 (+6.46%), unchanged pre-market
- Riot Platforms (RIOT): close at $17.08 (+3.52%), -0.12% at $17.06
- Core Scientific (CORZ): closed at $18.08 (+1.18%), -0.22% at $18.04
- CleanSpark (CLSK): closed at $10.45 (+0.97%), +0.29% at $10.48
- CoinShares Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI): Closed at $42.34 (-0.87%)
- Exodus Movement (EXOD): closed at $10.63 (+8.91%)
Crypto Cash Companies
- Strategy (MSTR): closed at $135.65 (+8.86%), -0.18% at $135.41
- Strive (ASST): closed at $8.54 (+19.19%), -1.41% at $8.42
- SharpLink Gaming (SBET): closed at $7.44 (+13.59%), +0.27% to $7.46
- Upexi (UPXI): closed at $0.83 (+35.86%), +4.53% at $0.86
- Lite Strategy (LITS): closed at $1.18 (+6.31%)
ETF Feed
Spot BTC ETF
- Daily net flows: $506.6 million
- Cumulative net flows: $54.56 billion
- Total BTC holdings ~1.26 million
ETH Spot ETF
- Daily net flows: $157.2 million
- Cumulative net flows: $11.67 billion
- Total ETH holdings ~5.64 million
Source: Farside Investors
