Open interest in Ethereum futures and options steadies as price retreats
- Ethereum price has come under intense pressure in the past few weeks.
- It has tumbled from last month’ high of $2,029 to $1,834.
- Open interest in the futures and options market has moved sideways.
Ethereum (ETH/USD) price has moved sideways in the past few weeks as demand for cryptocurrencies waned. Despite the weakness, the dollar value locked in the number of open Ethereum contracts has reemained steady in the past few days.
Data compiled by CoinGlass shows that the value of these contracts stands at $6.14 billion, where it has been in the past few weeks. It peaked at $6.32 billion after the outcome of the SEC vs Ripple case.
Most of the open interest is in Binance, the biggest crypto exchange in the world, which has $1.98 billion. It is followed by Bybit and OKX, which have $1.13 billion and $1.09 billion, respectively. Other large players are CME and Deribit.
Open interest in the futures market refers to the number of futures contracts held by market participants at the end of the trading session. A higher figure is seen as a positive thing for cryptocurrencies and other assets.
Bitcoin’s open interest has also remained quite steady recently. It stands at $13 billion, a few points lower than July’s high of $14.3 billion.
Meanwhile, open interest in Ethereum’s options market stood at $5.82 billion on Thursday, down from the year-to-date high of over $7.8 billion. There are 2,275,108 ETH calls compared to 792,579 ETH puts, which is a positive sign. Most of Ethereum calls are in Deribit followed by OKX, mCME, and Bybit.
Options are financial derivatives that give investors a right but not the obligation to sell or buy an asset at a certain price. Futures, on the other hand, gives them an obligation to buy or sell at the strike price.
Ethereum price has been in a bearish trend in the past few weeks. After peaking at $2,027 in July, ETH has tumbled by more than 9.40% to $1,835.
