$1.1B Bitcoin options expire as futures traders enter the new BTC price hike
Friday is here again and that means Bitcoin options contract expiration date. With the asset increasing by $50,000 this week, will the billion-dollar-plus notional price expire?
About 21,150 Bitcoin options contracts will expire on February 16. This week's ending event is a bit bigger than last week's, when BTC hit a high of $50,000.
Bitcoin options expire
According to Deribit, the notional value of this week's largest bitcoin contracts is $1.1 billion. Moreover, the put/call ratio is 0.90, which means that sellers of long and short contracts are fairly evenly distributed.
The $50,000 strike price remains very significant, with 15,766 calls and a notional value of $822 million this time. Additionally, the call ratio here is only 0.24, meaning the bulls are significantly outnumbered by the bears shorting at this strike price.
Interestingly, there is now a lot of open interest at much higher prices, namely $60,000, $65,000, and even $75,000. There is about $2.4 billion of long contract OI with a strike price of $60,000 to $75,000.
As K33 Research senior analyst Vettel Lunde told Bloomberg this week:
“In general, the options market is currently positioned for continued growth in the coming months.”
Read More: How to Trade Bitcoin Futures and Options Like a Pro
In the past week, flows have mostly been directed towards higher price action, he added.
“A lot of movement away from money calls.”
Now that space ETF fever has cooled, Bitcoin's momentum is being driven by the approaching halving and price cuts. However, inflows to separate BTC ETFs have reached a total of $4 billion, including outflows from Greyscale.
Ethereum contract expired
About 198,700 Ethereum options contracts expire on February 16. These have an estimated value of $565 million and a call ratio of 0.62.
Open interest was the largest at $585 million and 205,000 calls with a strike price of $3,000. However, at a strike price of $2,400, there is little to value OI at $460 million.
Read more: Introduction to Crypto Options Trading
At the time of writing, the price of Bitcoin was hovering above $52,000. Moreover, the property added a two-year high of $52,800 in late trading on February 15.
Ethereum led the markets today with a 2.5% gain, reaching $2,860, its highest price since May 2022.
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