Bitcoin pulls back from $64,500 as weak ETF flows, falling open interest cloud outlook

Bitcoin BTC$63,338.22 stalled on Tuesday, falling for the first time this month and breaking the longest stretch of gains since March. It had rallied to $64,500, its highest point in more than two weeks, on Monday.

Ether (ETH) tracked the larger cryptocurrency, dropping to $1,770 after hitting a high of $1,830 on Monday.

The July recovery can be attributed to a short-squeeze setup that was identified in late June, which saw heavy short interest despite bitcoin trading at its lowest point since 2024.

Bitcoin and other crypto tokens capitalized on a skew in short positions, recovering from oversold territory and advancing every day since the start of the month.

The total crypto market has grown by 8.4% since July 1, and is now worth $2.16 trillion.

U.S. equities fell in pre-market trading on Tuesday, with Nasdaq 100 index futures losing 0.9% since midnight UTC as the decline from June’s record high continues.

Derivatives positioning

• Over $500 million in leveraged crypto futures bets have been liquidated by exchanges in 24 hours, with shorts, or bearish positions, accounting for most of the tally for a sixth straight day.
• Despite the recent price strength, BTC’s futures open interest (OI) has slipped to 740K BTC, down from the July 3 high of 776K BTC. This shows that derivative traders are not participating in the price rise alongside a continued weakness in spot demand, as evidenced from ETF flows and the Coinbase premium. This raises questions about the sustainability of the gains.
• The same is true for ether (ETH), which recently outperformed BTC.
• OI in SOL has pulled back to 68 million tokens from the peak of over 76 million on June 24. The message is the same. The 10% rise in the token has so far failed to galvanize demand for leveraged plays.
• Canton Network’s CC token has declined by over 4% in 24 hours accompanied by a 3% uptick in the futures OI to 245.59 million tokens. This, coupled with negative funding rates and 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta, points to a growing bearish bias.
• Most tokens have a negative OI-adjusted CVD, a sign of bears being more aggressive by shorting at market orders rather than passive limit order plays. It suggests potential for losses ahead.
• Bitcoin’s 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, has jumped to 40%, snapping a six-day losing streak. Still, the gauge remains well below January highs near 60% in a positive sign for crypto bulls. The same is true for ether’s index, EVIV.
• On Deribit, options continue to showcase lingering downside concerns in both bitcoin and ether. Options volume in BTC paints a mixed picture with both calls and puts making it to the list of top traded bets in the past 24 hours.
• On decentralized exchange Derive, a large long call condor strategy on HYPE crossed the tape, indicating expectations for a range play between $75 and $80 till July 24.

Token talk

• The altcoin market continues to show internal contradictions. Tokens like FET, KASPA and WLD have all posted losses despite the broader marketwide recovery this week, while ETHFI and LIT have outperformed, adding more than 30% over the past seven days.
• WLFI$0.05813 was one of the top-performing tokens on Tuesday, rising 4.8. It’s worth noting that the token, linked to the family of President Donald Trump, is down by more than 89% since it was created last August.
• The decoupling of some altcoins demonstrates a maturing of the sector, with token performance based on underlying sentiment and onchain activity. Historically, the entire altcoin market moved in unison.
• CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season indicator is at 46/100, below Friday’s high and higher than in May, when it was consistently around 30/100.