First Mover Americas: Bitcoin Treads Water Below $26K

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Bitcoin continued its subdued start to the week, having traded below $26,000 for the past 24 hours. BTC held between $25,500 and $25,750 during the Asian trading session today. The enthusiasm following last week’s ruling that the SEC must review its rejection of Grayscale Investments’ application to turn its bitcoin trust into an ETF has subsided, with other applications still kept waiting by the U.S. regulator. The broader crypto market remains in a similarly sideways trend, with the CoinDesk Market Index (CMI) down 0.42% in 24 hours.

Crypto derivatives platform Deribit saw trading volume increase 17% to $42 billion in August even as global activity declined by 12% to around $1.6 trillion. The driving force behind the increase was Deribit’s options segment, with ETH options recording their highest volumes since March, Chief Commercial Officer Luuk Strijers told CoinDesk. Bitcoin experienced significant price swings between $25,000 and $30,000, triggering massive liquidations in futures and options on the platform and boosting hedging demand for options contracts. Deribit controls nearly 90% of global crypto options activity.

A survey by trade association the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE) reflected a divided attitude toward offering crypto-related products and services. As part of a study of cryptocurrency trading infrastructure, the WFE surveyed its member exchanges, with 12 of the 29 respondents (41%) saying they are already offering crypto-related products or services. A further seven plan to offer them in the future, with 10 saying they have no such plans. The survey was conducted between May and July 2022, some months before FTX’s collapse, which may have damped attitudes to crypto further since.

Chart of the Day

• The chart shows daily changes in the number of MKR held in wallets tied to centralized exchanges since November 2022.
• On Monday, the so-called exchange balance fell by 14,140 MKR to 65,000 MKR, the lowest since June 21.
• Dwindling exchange balance is often taken to represent investor bias for long-term holding strategy.
• Source: Coinglass

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