From CoinDesk · By Oliver Knight, Omkar Godbole
Bitcoin’s gain came as South Korea’s Kospi jumped 6.6% and Nasdaq-100 futures added 0.5%. SK Hynix surged around 11% after reporting a sevenfold jump in profit.
Pepe advanced 9.4% after Arkham Intelligence said wallets it links to Tron founder Justin Sun hold around $51 million of the token.
U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs took in $176 million on Tuesday, a second day of inflows, according to Farside Investors.
Bitcoin BTC$84,459.46 rose around 0.8% since midnight UTC to $81,400 on Monday after dropping below $80,000 on Tuesday. The altcoin market also showed strength, with ether ETH$2,490.55 gaining 0.9% and the CoinDesk Memecoin Index advancing 1.3%.
Asian chip stocks led a rebound in AI shares. South Korea’s Kospi index jumped 6.6% as SK Hynix surged around 11% after reporting a sevenfold jump in profit. Nasdaq-100 index futures gained 0.5%.
The Federal Reserve is due to announce its decision on U.S. interest rates at 18:00 UTC, with CME’s FedWatch tool showing around a 92% chance of no change. Traders will be looking to Chair Kevin Wash’s press conference for clues on whether any increases are on the cards.
U.S. spot ETFs took in $176 million on Tuesday, a second day of inflows, while Alphabet GOOG and Microsoft MSFT report earnings after markets close.
Derivatives Positioning
Futures activity: Crypto futures trading volume rose 7.5% to $163.2 billion in 24 hours, while open interest (OI) rose only 1.3%. That means the market traded more without taking on much extra exposure. Liquidations jumped 38% to $183.6 million. Taker volume was split 50.7% long and 49.3% short, which is pretty much even.
BTC and ETH: BTC rose 2.3% while its open interest slipped 0.1%, so the gain did not come with fresh leveraged bets. ETH added 2.7% and its open interest rose 1.7%, which, again, is less than the price move. Funding is positive but mild in both, at 0.0090% for BTC and 0.0079% for ETH, close to the 0.01% baseline, so there are no signs of crowding. BTC and ETH also suffered the largest liquidations, at $56.4 million and $46.0 million, over half of the market total.
ZEC sees capital inflows: Zcash’s open interest jumped 14% compared with a 6.3% price gain, the clearest sign of new money coming in among larger coins. With funding at 0.0076%, the build-up does not look overheated. Liquidations of $8.6 million were the highest among altcoins.
Mixed action in gold: Open interest in XAU futures fell 10% even as price edged up 1.4%, a sign that money left the market. Open interest in XAUT, Tether’s gold token, rose 11.6% on a 1.3% price gain, so money came in there.
Traders lean bearish on crude oil: Open interest in CL, the crude oil front-month future, rose 3.3% while the price slipped 0.7%, and volume surged 26%. Funding is negative at -0.0135%, the most negative among the biggest contracts, so perp traders are leaning short.