Our weekly crypto derivatives analytics report delves into macro events, the current state of crypto and trading signals from spot trading volume, and futures, options and perpetual contracts.

December's end-of-year options expiration brought an unexpected drop as realized volatility fell to the lowest levels of the month. Perpetual swap open interest remained stable, indicating these markets weren't heavily used for hedging against expired options, likely contributing to the muted volatility. 

While most expired open interest in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) hasn't been reinvested, the balance of calls and puts remains consistent. Notably, ETH options are pricing in higher implied volatility as compared to BTC, particularly for shorter expirations, leading to a flat term structure for ETH, while BTC is offering cheaper options exposure.

In the perpetual markets, low volatility and minimal spot movements have led funding rates for nearly all tokens to mirror broader market sentiment throughout the holiday season. On the options side, BTC's term structure is noticeably lower and steeper than ETH's, with realized volatility now dipping below implied volatility levels, highlighting an intriguing shift in market dynamics.

Please check out the report’s highlights.

Open Interest Solid Amid Year-End Options Expiration

Although open interest for both BTC and ETH perpetual swaps hasn’t returned to early December 2024 highs, it remained robust throughout the significant end-of-year options expiration event. This suggests that these markets weren’t heavily utilized to 

 of the expiring options contracts, likely contributing to the lack of volatility observed during this period. Instead, trading volumes have dipped noticeably during the winter holiday season, coinciding with a collapse in realized volatility back to December 2024’s lowest levels.

BTC Option Curve Remains Steep During Call-Put Parity

The expiration of December's end-of-year options didn’t trigger the anticipated surge in volatility; instead, realized volatility has plummeted to the lower end of its recent range. The implied volatility term structure remains steep compared to both its recent behavior and ETH's, with longer-dated implied volatility around 57%, and 1-week at-the-money options trading about five points lower. Much of the expired open interest hasn’t yet been rolled into new positions, maintaining a neutral balance between puts and calls. Consequently, BTC's options market positioning is relatively neutral, lacking the leverage it had at the start of December 2024.

Huge ETH Option Expiring Doesn’t Cause Volatility

A late December spike in realized volatility didn’t carry into the new year, with ETH’s spot price currently exhibiting volatility below that of short-tenor implied volatility. Interestingly, the implied volatility term structure has undergone a steepening and re-flattening over the past week, contrasting with BTC’s slightly steeper profile. This suggests that ETH’s options market is anticipating higher short-term volatility in spot price movements. 

Despite the significant expiration of options open interest at the end of December 2024, which didn’t lead to a rollover into later expirations, call options continue to dominate the market and have increased at the start of 2025.

Advanced

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Bybit X Block Scholes Crypto Derivatives Analytics Report (Jan 2, 2025): BTC Options Continue to See Call-Put Parity, With Lower Short-Term Volatility Expected

Dive into FLock, a decentralized platform that revolutionizes the way AI models are developed, trained and deployed.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to transform countless industries, but its development often raises questions about privacy, control and inclusivity. 

 is a unique decentralized platform that democratizes AI training, fine-tuning and inferencing. With its blockchain-powered infrastructure, FLock ensures transparency, security and community-driven decision-making, paving the way for AI models that align with established societal values. 

In this article, we’ll explore how FLock decentralizes AI training, its key features and its potential impact on developers, communities and users.

 platform that revolutionizes the way AI models are developed, trained and deployed. By leveraging blockchain technology and a novel approach called 

, FLock addresses critical issues in AI development, such as centralized control, lack of transparency and privacy concerns.

At its core, FLock’s mission is to democratize AI by enabling communities to participate directly in the creation and refinement of AI models. Through federated learning, FLock trains AI models across multiple decentralized devices or servers. This method ensures that data remains local, eliminating the need for raw data exchange while still enabling robust model training. By decentralizing the training process, FLock not only protects individual privacy, but also fosters a more inclusive ecosystem in which diverse contributors can collaborate.

What sets FLock apart is its integration of 

. This ensures that all contributions — whether data, compute power or feedback — are transparently recorded and fairly rewarded. Blockchain tech’s immutable ledger enhances trust among participants and safeguards the process against manipulation. Additionally, the platform’s on-chain incentive mechanisms encourage participation from a wide range of contributors, ensuring that rewards are distributed equitably.

Ultimately, FLock empowers communities to develop bespoke AI models tailored to their specific needs. By decentralizing the process and prioritizing transparency and collaboration, FLock breaks the monopoly of large corporations, creating an AI ecosystem that aligns with public ethics and societal values.

, an Oxford alumnus with a robust background in AI and blockchain technology. Sun, who serves as FLock's CEO, has an impressive career trajectory, having worked as the Director of AI for the Royal Bank of Canada and as an AI Research Fellow at Imperial College London. His vision for FLock stems from a deep understanding of both the technical and ethical challenges of AI development.

The founding team also includes other Oxford alumni, boasting over a decade of combined experience in AI research and the cryptocurrency industry. This team brings a collective blend of academic excellence and practical expertise that positions FLock to lead the decentralized AI movement.

FLock has successfully raised $11 million in funding across two rounds, reflecting strong investor confidence in its vision. In May 2024, FLock secured a $6 million seed round co-led by Lightspeed Faction and Tagus Capital, with additional backing from Digital Currency Group (DCG), Volt Capital, OKX Ventures and Inception Capital.

Later, in December 2024, FLock announced a $3 million successful funding round led by DCG and joined by prominent names like Animoca Brands, Fenbushi Capital, GnosisVC and GSR. These investments are being channelled into enhancing the platform’s testnet and federated learning client, accelerating FLock’s mission of enabling secure, collaborative AI development.

With this funding and over 1,500 nodes contributing from platforms like Numerai and Kaggle, FLock is rapidly scaling its impact on decentralized AI training.

FLock AI revolutionizes AI development through its decentralized training framework. This approach allows participants to contribute to AI model training without ever sharing their personal data. Instead, models are trained locally across devices using federated learning, which ensures that data remains with its owners while still enhancing the accuracy of the model overall. 

FLock’s reward system is designed to incentivize active participation. Contributors who provide data, computational power and/or feedback are compensated with FLOCK tokens, ensuring a fair distribution of rewards. 

FLock empowers its community through a robust governance framework. Decisions regarding AI model development, deployment and ethical considerations are driven by the community, ensuring alignment with established societal values. Through blockchain-based voting mechanisms, contributors can influence the direction of AI projects, fostering transparency and public accountability. 

FLock’s modular architecture allows contributors to participate in specific aspects of AI model development. Whether providing raw data or computational power or even refining algorithms, the platform enables a collaborative and scalable development process. 

At the core of FLock’s philosophy is its commitment to privacy and security. By leveraging blockchain technology, the platform ensures that no single entity controls the AI development process. Data remains local and protected by cryptographic measures, while the immutability of blockchain guarantees transparency in every transaction and model update. 

 begins with a blockchain and an AI layer.

The blockchain layer underpins FLock’s incentivization and security mechanisms.

The AI layer facilitates model training, refinement and deployment, leveraging both centralized and federated approaches.

Let’s have a look at the supply and demand for the FLOCK token.

FLock adopts a 1:2 ratio model between team/investors (33.3%) and community (66.7%), prioritizing community-driven growth and ecosystem expansion. The majority of tokens are allocated to incentivize user participation and long-term ecosystem success.

FLock aims to improve the future of AI development by decentralizing the training process and ensuring transparency, privacy and inclusivity. By leveraging blockchain and federated learning, FLock empowers communities to contribute to AI creation without compromising on privacy. Its innovative reward system and community-driven governance foster a fair and collaborative ecosystem. 

With significant backing and a growing network of contributors, FLock is positioning itself as a leader in decentralized AI, offering a more ethical and secure alternative to traditional AI development models. As it continues to scale, FLock is set to transform the way AI models are built and deployed.

 — and earn a share of a 10 million FLOCK prize pool. For more details, visit 

Intermediate

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FLock AI: Decentralized AI Training

In this tutorial, we’ll explore how you can complete a series of tasks in Network3 for Bybit Web3 Airdrop Arcade.

Task 1: Register for a Network3 Account and Connect Your Bybit Wallet 

: Navigate to the campaign page and click on the 

task. Click on the task, and Galxe will ask to redirect you to the Network3 register page.

: Register for a Network3 account using your email address. You may indicate a 

Task 2: Download the Network3 App and Run a Node for One Hour

 and choose your operating system to download the Network3 app.

 or powerbutton, depending upon which operating system you’re using. For ease of reference, we’ve used macOS and iOS as examples below.

: Keep running the node until the timer reaches 

Beginner

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How to Complete Network3 Tasks for Bybit Web3 Airdrop Arcade

Bybit launched the Bybit Merch Creative Challenge for university students worldwide, offering a $50,000 USDT prize pool.

The S&P 500 dropped 0.22% on Thursday, its fifth straight decline, with investors eyeing Friday’s economic updates. Coindesk Indices, an index measuring broader cryptocurrency market performance was up by 2.03%, with Bitcoin and Ether rising by 2.79% and 2.70%, respectively in the past 24 hours.

Today's top performer is XRP, which surged 1.9% following a rise in price driven by increased open interest and positive market sentiment.

Ripple (XRP), launched in August 2012, is a blockchain technology company focused on improving international payments with its cryptocurrency, XRP. XRP price surged due to increased open interest, a major XRP transfer, and market sentiment linked to Trump's inauguration. Bullish momentum is supported by high short liquidations, with key resistance levels to watch for further price movement.

Check Out the Latest Prices, Charts, and Data of 

 for university students worldwide, offering a $50,000 USDT prize pool. Participants can design exclusive Bybit merchandise, with submissions open until Jan. 15, 2025. Winners will be announced on Feb. 1, 2025, across four prize categories.

Yesterday, Bitcoin Spot ETFs recorded a total inflow of $84.8M, driven by $107.9M from non-GBTC funds, partially offset by a $23.1M outflow from GBTC.

, offering an airdrop for participants who complete tasks like swapping and bridging using the Mango wallet. Points earned through tasks determine airdrop rewards. Join via the Mango wallet and follow steps on the testnet dashboard.

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Bybit Launches $50,000 Merch Design Challenge for University Students Worldwide

Bybit Learn

Blockchain

AirDAO is the next generation of the Ambrosus project, aiming to deliver an integrated web3 experience to its community. Learn more about how it works here.

The cryptocurrency sphere is becoming increasingly saturated with decentralized finance (

) projects, but many of these projects share a common issue — specifically, they’re relatively challenging for the everyday investor to use. This may be because of poor design that requires extensive technical expertise or other factors. While AirDAO, previously known as Ambrosus, was launched as yet another crypto project several years ago, it stands apart from others in exciting ways.

What Is AirDAO (Formerly Known as Ambrosus)?

AirDAO’s DeFi project gives its users direct access to related services without the need for an intermediary. The AirDAO Network is a 

 blockchain system, governed by its community, with over 160 validators around the world for optimized security. From the initial onboarding process, the project is designed with ease of use in mind. Once a new user is established in the community, they have access to numerous products that are equally easy to use. 

Ambrosus launched in 2017 with the goal of serving the Internet of Things (

) and supply chain niches. In Mar 2022, a new chapter for this project opened with its 

. A large portion of this transition was completed by the Ambrosus team by late 2022 to early 2023. This transition from the Ambrosus ecosystem to AirDAO brought changes to both leadership and branding. It also resulted in the release of numerous new products, including AirBond Marketplace, Staking, FirepotSwap, the Network Explorer and others.

When the Ambrosus team decided to transition to AirDAO, numerous projects required attention. Much of the work was completed by the first quarter of 2023. The project then shifted its focus away from supply chain management to DeFi. A significant rebranding campaign also took place, and leadership under CTO Igor Stadnyk was transferred to CEO Lang Mei. In addition, the team grew in size from 15 to 33 people.

The AirDAO team is focused on creating a better DeFi user experience (

), accomplished through the platform’s straightforward dashboard and the development of a mobile app. In addition, the available products make it easy for users to complete transactions, generate staking rewards and complete other tasks. 

AirDAO continues to develop with numerous improvements planned over the next year, which will further improve UX and add functionality.

AirDAO is a Layer 1 blockchain that allows users to create their own applications. The project is compatible with 

 (Ethereum virtual machine). As a result, the user-created applications are interoperable with Ethereum, as well as other EVM-compatible blockchains. 

Because of its extensive network of validators, AirDAO provides optimized security. In addition, it collects individual 

, so its scalability is exponential. Even those users who lack extensive technical expertise can take advantage of AirDAO, thanks to the dashboard’s easy-to-use interface.

All AirDAO products are accessible through the site’s dashboard, which is designed with cards for each product, as well as subdomains and direct links. What are the features of AirDAO?

 interface. Users must have a supported wallet connected to the platform to use this feature. To use FirepotSwap, simply provide details of the tokens that you want to swap. You’ll see the 

 tolerance for that pair below the order details. Then, you simply click a button to complete the swap.

 features three classes of nodes: Hermes, Atlas and Apollo. Each one plays a vital role in the network’s operation. Node operators are delegated via 

, and are automated. AirDAO has a staking-as-a-service (

 and locked staking. A user must stake at least 1,000 AMB to get started, and rewards are distributed every six hours.

As part of AirDAO’s goal of delivering a straightforward UX, the 

 supports the easy conversion and transfer of assets. Specifically, it allows users to convert AMB tokens to other types of 

 tokens. It also makes the transfer of assets on Ethereum, BNB Chain or their supported applications easier.

AirDAO’s navigation system is known as 

. It has a simplified interface for fast and easy navigation, and offers quick views of nodes, blocks, contracts transactions and balances. Network Explorer is accessible to all users, and is one of the reasons AirDAO stands ahead of other DeFi blockchain systems.

To commemorate the transition of the Ambrosus ecosystem to AirDAO, AirBond tokens were 

 to community members. Celebrating the project’s fourth anniversary, this was a 

 is currently only available as a beta version. It’s the newest product released for the benefit of AirDAO community members. AirBond Marketplace users can trade their BOND, which are vested AMB bonds, for tokens. 

The Ambrosus ecosystem was established in 2017, and the transition to AirDAO took place through 2022 and into early 2023. During this period, a new website with the project’s rebranding and improved interface was launched, along with the development of numerous products. 

Going forward, AirDAO will introduce elastic block rewards for those who lock their AMB tokens, and node rewards will be paid in 

 mechanism will launch, and the distribution of AirDAO Treasury funds will be established. Looking further ahead, there are plans for a mobile 

, the launch of AirDAO Name Service, a Proof of Attendance Protocol and more.

AMB is the native token of AirDAO. It’s used to pay on-chain gas fees and to complete transactions, and to support node validation and community governance. The 

 of AMB is established at 6.5 billion. This is a 

. Currently, AMB has a total supply of 6.3 billion and a circulating supply of 1.5 billion. 

As of Jun 26, 2023, AMB’s price is $0.00846. The market cap is approximately $13 million, and the trading volume is roughly $2.46 million. 

According to experts at PricePrediction, the price of AMB 

 to $0.031 by the end of 2023. This may increase to $0.067 by the end of 2025. In 2028, the AMB price could hit $0.20, and may jump to $0.39 by 2030. 

The initial decline in growth is substantiated by 

, who predict that AMB will close 2023 at $0.0195 and increase to $0.0316 in 2025, $0.0489 in 2028 and $0.0936 in 2030.

Looking to trade AMB? You can do so on Bybit in the form of USDT Perpetual Contracts. Simply 

As the native token of AirDAO, AMB is essential for accessing the platform's features and products. AirDAO is designed to be a next-level DeFi project that caters to the average user who may not have considerable technical expertise. By doing so, it puts the many advantages of DeFi in more hands. 

While many people will choose to use the AMB token to swap tokens and complete other activities via AirDAO, the token may also simply be a good investment. Despite its initial decline in price, slow and steady growth is projected over the next several years, presenting you the perfect opportunity to 

The AirDAO community continues to focus on making strategic improvements to the platform in order to further enhance the user experience. As these improvements roll out, the usage of AirDAO and the AMB token will likely increase. Of course, it’s always important to do your own research (

While there are numerous active projects in DeFi today, many of them lack the design and interface necessary to truly appeal to the masses. AirDAO, however, presents its well-designed products to users through a simplified dashboard interface, making it well-suited to users, regardless of their level of technical expertise. With so many products available and with more in development, get to know more about AirDAO today.

AirDAO (AMB): A Community-Governed Layer 1 Blockchain

Grab Up to 5,000 USDT in Rewards

Grab Up to 5,000 USDT in Rewards