Will $9.5B Bitcoin Options Expiry Drive Markets Higher? 

Approximately 98,500 Bitcoin options contracts will expire on Friday, Nov. 29, in a large end-of-month expiry event.

They have a notional value of $9.48 billion, which is more than triple that of last week’s expiry. However, it is still likely to be eclipsed by the end of December’s year-end event.

Bitcoin Options Expiry

This week’s tranche of Bitcoin options contracts has a put/call ratio of 0.84, meaning that slightly more long (call) contracts are expiring than short (puts) contracts.

According to Deribit, open interest, or the value or number of options contracts yet to expire, is highest at the $100,000 strike price, with $2 billion in OI.

Crypto derivatives provider Greeks Live reported that the Bitcoin options market has seen massive block trades, with more than $120 million in cumulative block call option trades being made on Nov. 26.

“The giant whales are on the move, and a big market is likely just around the corner,” it added.

“BTC realized volatility has dropped to 50, while ETH holds firmer at 70. Implied volatility is flat for BTC but climbing for ETH,” noted Deribit in its weekly bulletin.

In addition to today’s Bitcoin options, around 412,000 Ethereum contracts are expiring today. These have a notional value of $1.47 billion and a put/call ratio of 0.74, bringing Friday’s combined crypto options expiry notional value to around $11 billion.

Crypto Market Outlook

Total market capitalization has remained flat over the past 24 hours at $3.5 trillion, close to its all-time high. Since the beginning of November, around a trillion dollars have entered the crypto asset space.

Bitcoin took an intraday dip to $94,700 before rebounding strongly during the Friday morning Asian trading session, adding $2,000 and tumbling to $96,700. The asset appears to be consolidating at this level, where it has been for the past week or so.

We got a 11% pullback on $BTC and people are literally saying the end is imminent.

It was literally less than 10 days ago when the same people were asking for a pullback to buy.

Now they are saying "I'll wait for lower".

Ok.

— Greeks.live (@GreeksLive) November 28, 2024

Ethereum has largely held on to gains and was trading just below $3,600 at the time of writing.

XRP was performing well, climbing 7% to reach $1.57, while Cardano (ADA) was up 5% to reach $1.05 at the time of writing. Altcoins, in general, were making gains this Friday as markets remained buoyant despite the minor pullback.