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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.
A historic $6 billion liquidation on Oct 10, 2025, triggered by renewed US–China trade tensions, dealt a heavy blow to perpetual swap markets, with Bybit traders showing little appetite to re-enter lost positions. Although diplomatic progress led to a signed trade deal, sentiment was quickly overshadowed by Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s hawkish tone during the FOMC press conference. Despite a 25 bps rate cut, Powell warned that further easing in December was “far from” guaranteed, prompting risk-off reactions as BTC dropped to $107K and short-tenor put-call skews tilted sharply bearish, reversing a brief bullish shift in 7-day smiles.
Open interest in perpetuals remains stagnant at around $10B, reflecting post-liquidation caution. In options markets, BTC and ETH volatility skews briefly favored calls, but have reverted to downside bias. ATM implied volatility remains elevated, though term structures for both assets have normalized.
Sources: Bybit, Block Scholes
The $19B crypto liquidation on October 10, triggered by President Trump’s 100% tariff hike on China, continues to weigh heavily on perpetual swap markets. Over two weeks later, trader appetite remains subdued, with notional open interest stuck below $10B and BTC and ETH spot prices range-bound between $105K and $115K. This lack of momentum persists, despite record highs in US equities, highlighting crypto’s decoupling from broader risk-on sentiment.
Notably, the composition of open interest remains unchanged. BTC still accounts for roughly half, with the other half spread across eight tracked altcoins — mirroring pre-liquidation levels as the month draws to a close.
Sources: Bybit, Block Scholes
Unlike the sharp deleveraging seen in perpetual markets, BTC options open interest has steadily climbed throughout the month, signaling continued use by Bybit traders for hedging and speculation. At-the-money implied volatility remains elevated across the term structure, reflecting sustained demand for optionality since October 10 — even in a historically low-volatility environment.
Traders have shown a willingness to push up short-tenor volatility during stress events, briefly inverting the curve. Though the inversion was short-lived, it left behind a higher baseline in volatility pricing, particularly concentrated in put options.
Sources: Bybit, Block Scholes
World Liberty Financial (WLF), a DeFi protocol backed by the Trump family, has seen its governance token, WLFI, rebound 25% from a local low of $0.12 on October 23 to $0.15, despite being down nearly 30% since its launch. On October 29, WLF announced an 8.4M WLFI airdrop to early users of its USD1 points program, tied to its proprietary stablecoin USD1. This follows a mid-September governance vote that approved a buyback-and-burn initiative, allocating all liquidity pool fees from Ethereum, Solana and BNB Chain to reduce the WLFI supply permanently.
While these moves have supported WLFI’s spot price, perpetual funding rates remain volatile, reflecting a mixed sentiment among traders and uncertainty about the sustainability of the rally.