Crypto prices stage a weekly recovery, but bears still hold the structural advantage: Crypto Markets Today

The crypto market is ending the week in a healthier position than where it started, with bitcoin BTC$61,828.93 trading at $61,600 after having risen by 6.5% from Tuesday’s almost two-year low of $57,750.

Still, the largest cryptocurrency’s gains on Friday were muted in comparison with Thursday’s 2.6% advance, which benefited from weak U.S. job data that lowered expectations for a Federal Reserve interest-rate increase.

The interest-rate outlook echoed for a second day as the U.S. entered a long weekend with stock markets closed. Ether (ETH) rose for a third straight day to add 11.5% since Tuesday and 2.6% on Friday alone. Other altcoins also advanced, with ADA$0.1702, zcash (ZEC) and dash (DASH) all gaining between 2.2% and 3.1%.

Still, the broader market structure remains bearish across the majority of crypto tokens following a succession of lower highs and lower lows. For bitcoin to reverse the downtrend, it needs to trade back above $67,000 and then take out $81,000, which was the local high in May.

Derivatives positioning

• Ether replaced bitcoin as the biggest token for 24-hour liquidations. A total of $417 million worth of crypto futures bets were liquidated in 24 hours, of which $160.80 million are from the ether market. BTC, a distant second, notched $97 million. This shows just how bearish positioning on ether was.
• Ether futures’ open interest (OI) still stood at 14.31 million, the most since June 10, with annualized funding rates of nearly 10% and the highest 24-hour cumulative volume delta (CVD) among majors. The combination points to growing demand for bullish exposure in the market, a sign traders are anticipating continued price gains.
• OI in DOGE futures tallied 14.13 billion tokens, the highest since May 16. The number has been growing since June 28, a sign of renewed demand for leverage. The DOGE situation is similar to ether’s bullish picture.
• While ETH and DOGE have led OI growth over 24 hours, futures tied to HBAR and ZEC have seen the opposite. HBAR has the most negative 24-hour CVD among majors, a sign bears are becoming more aggressive in shorting at market orders than passive limit orders.
• Most tokens have positive CVD, a sign of bulls’ leadership in the market.
• Both bitcoin and ether 30-day implied volatility indexes continue to slide, reversing the June pop, signaling market calm and potential for continued bullish price action.
• On Deribit, the most traded BTC options of 24 hours are calls at strikes ranging from $60,000 to $70,000. Call options represent a bullish bet on the market. Ether options show a similar bullish mood, with the $2,500 call seeing the most activity.
• Block flows featured a large BTC long call condor, a strategy betting on a range play between $66,000 and $68,000 till July 17.

Token talk

• Uniswap (UNI) led gains in altcoins following Thursday’s announcement confirming that it will be the primary automated market maker (AMM) for the Robinhood layer-2 blockchain.
• UNI is up by more than 11% in the past 24 hours with daily trading volume doubling to $320 million, still reaping the benefits of its tie-up with Robinhood announced July 1.
• AI tokens FET, RENDER and TAO also demonstrated positive signs on Friday, rising by between 1.5% and 2.3% since midnight UTC after weeks of sell pressure.
• CoinMarketCap’s “Altcoin Season” indicator is at 46/100, still firmly in the neutral zone it has occupied for the past month as the market awaits a return to risk-on sentiment.
• Solana (SOL) is leading the rally among crypto majors. It has now surged by more than 17% over the past week, trading at $80 after dropping to as low as $68 the week before.