The crypto market remained in a buoyant mood on Thursday like bitcoin trading near its weekly high around $93,500 and ether rose to $3,200 after completing his Fusaka upgrade.
The Fear and Greed index rose to 27/100, exiting the “extreme fear” zone as a degree of optimism begins to enter the market.
It is worth noting that bitcoin and the majority of other tokens remain in downward trends since the beginning of October, forming a series of lower highs and lower lows. To break the trend, bitcoin needs to start forming highs above $98,500, which would show signs of a meaningful bullish reversal.
The CoinDesk 20 (CD20) index added 1.13% in the past 24 hours as the market began to build on Tuesday’s rally.
Derivatives positioning
- Bitcoin’s option-based 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, fell to 48.44%, its lowest since Nov. 14, reversing a 65% pop on Nov. 21, when spot prices fell to nearly $80,000 on some exchanges.
- The decline invalidates the bullish trend line from September, pointing to a low-volatility environment ahead, supporting the bull case in the spot price.
- The Ether Volatility Index fell to 72%, the lowest since November 3rd.
- On Deribit, BTC continues to draw premium to calls across all timeframes, while ether options are showing slight bullishness after the August 2026 expiration. This is a sign of continued demand for protective put and call overwriting strategies.
- The $100,000 call has again become the most popular choice with open interest at $2.82 billion.
- Strangles dominated block streams in both bitcoin and ether.
- In the futures market, ZEC has seen open interest (OI) growth of over 6% in 24 hours, and ETH’s OI is up 4%. There are signs of speculative activity in FART futures, with OI up 22%.
Token talk
- Altcoin market remains muted despite broader market strength.
- CoinMarketCap’s “altcoin season” indicator ticked down to 20/100 after being five points higher at the start of the month.
- The move highlights how investors are showing signs of preference for bitcoin as opposed to altcoin plays that typically involve more risk.
- There were a few exceptions to this rule over the past 24 hours: TAO, ENA and AVAX have all posted gains between 4.5% and 8.5%.
- On the other hand, hedera (HBAR) fell 3.8% as momentum from the introduction of a spot ETF begins to wane along with trading volume, which fell 15% to $245 million over the past 24 hours.
- The difference between the altcoin market today and the market a year ago is stark: in late 2024 it was frothing with viral memecoins and the rise of decentralized derivatives exchanges, while now it seems the retail crowd has left, or moved on, leaving behind a range of tokens that rise and fall based on actual development as opposed to purely speculative ones.
- This maturation bodes well for future cycles because it means sectors have the potential to outperform broader trends, as demonstrated by the recent surge in privacy coins during a period when bitcoin and ether fell to multi-month lows.
- By the way, private life coins have now entered a corrective phase after the rally from September to the end of November. ZEC has lost 29.4% over the past week, while DASH fell 22%.
