{"id":106770,"date":"2025-05-16T16:55:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-16T16:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/106770\/"},"modified":"2025-05-16T16:55:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-16T16:55:10","slug":"3b-in-crypto-options-expire-today-will-it-trigger-a-market-drop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/106770\/","title":{"rendered":"$3B in crypto options expire today \u2014 Will it trigger a market drop?"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">$3B in crypto options expired on the 16th of May, but next week positioning was somewhat bullish.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For June, Option traders expected BTC to rally to $110K-$125K with a $95K as floor price.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>On the 16th of May, at 8:00 UTC, $3 billion worth of crypto options expired. <a href=\"https:\/\/ambcrypto.com\/category\/bitcoin-news\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">Bitcoin [BTC]<\/a>\u00a0 accounted for $2.6B of the notional value, while <a href=\"https:\/\/ambcrypto.com\/category\/ethereum-news\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">Ethereum [ETH]<\/a> had $252 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>According to Deribit data, BTC had a max pain of $100K, and the ETH level was at $2,200. Max pain is a level that most options will expire worthless, and sometimes act as a price magnet.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>On the positioning front, Deribit <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/DeribitOfficial\/status\/1922923301598527668\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow external noreferrer\" data-wpel-link=\"external\">stated<\/a>,\u00a0<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cBTC skew is neutral, ETH puts slightly outweigh calls. Price action could get interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Crypto-options-1-scaled.jpeg\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-492157\" class=\"size-full wp-image-492157\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"crypto options\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1154\" data-lazy- data-lazy- data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Crypto-options-1-scaled.jpeg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-492157\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: Deribit\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The positioning was reflected by the Put\/Call ratio. A value above 1 indicates more puts (bearish bets) than calls (bullish bets) while values below 1 lean towards the bulls\u2019 side. <\/p>\n<p>Put simply, ETH had more bearish bets ahead of the Friday expiry, while BTC was at 1 \u2014 neutral.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Post-Friday expiry market reaction<\/p>\n<p>At the time of writing, about 2 hours after the 15 May expiry, BTC was valued at $103.8K, jumped 2% from Thursday\u2019s low of $101K. <\/p>\n<p>For ETH, it traded at $2.6K, up 6% from Thursday\u2019s low of $2.4K.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This showed ETH was <a href=\"https:\/\/ambcrypto.com\/bitcoin-holds-steady-while-ethereum-gains-momentum-whats-next\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\">relatively volatile<\/a> than BTC, and the $3B expiry didn\u2019t stir much retracement as earlier feared.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Looking forward, Amberdata\u2019s 25RR (25-delta risk reversal) were positive for next Friday\u2019s (23 May) and end of May (30th) expiries. <\/p>\n<p>The metric\u2019s positive reading meant that calls outpaced puts (more bullish than bearish bets), reflecting positive market sentiment for the last part of May.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Screenshot-2025-05-16-132832.png\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-492160\" class=\"size-full wp-image-492160\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"crypto options\" width=\"813\" height=\"451\" data-lazy- data-lazy- data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Screenshot-2025-05-16-132832.png\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-492160\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/pro.amberdata.io\/options\/deribit\/btc\/current\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow external noreferrer\" data-wpel-link=\"external\">Amberdata <\/a>(Volality tracker, as of 16 May, 11 UTC)\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>However, there was no strong macro or crypto-centric catalyst to push BTC higher after the U.S.-China trade deal lifted it to over $100K the previous week.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Whether Fed rate expectations will drive BTC going forward remains to be seen. However, the most popular call buying in the past 24 hours was targeting $ 110K-$120K for end June expiries.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>For the 23rd of May expiry, the $107K call option was popular, too. However, the $95K put for June expiry appeared as the likely floor price in early summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Screenshot-2025-05-16-124553.png\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-492162\" class=\"size-full wp-image-492162\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"Crypto option\" width=\"830\" height=\"431\" data-lazy- data-lazy- data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Screenshot-2025-05-16-124553.png\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-492162\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.deribit.com\/statistics\/BTC\/metrics\/options\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow external noreferrer\" data-wpel-link=\"external\">Deribit\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Overall, the positioning showed that option traders expected a potential BTC all-time-high (ATH) in late May or June with a downside risk target of $95K.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>CryptoQuant analyst Axel Adler reiterated a similar projection, <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/AxelAdlerJr\/status\/1922898788173115691\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow external noreferrer\" data-wpel-link=\"external\">stating<\/a> that BTC was currently undervalued from the STH (Short-term holder) MVRV metric.<\/p>\n<p> He highlighted that, if there is no negative market catalyst, BTC pressure could heighten at $118K in June.\u00a0<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cThe current STH MVRV is 1.09. The first significant wave of selling pressure is expected around 1.25 (price target \u2248 $118K), with a stronger one likely at 1.35 (\u2248 $128K)\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Crypto-Options-scaled.jpeg\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-492165\" class=\"size-full wp-image-492165\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"Crypto Options \" width=\"2560\" height=\"1440\" data-lazy- data-lazy- data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Crypto-Options-scaled.jpeg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-492165\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source: Axel Adler\/X\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tNext: <a href=\"https:\/\/ambcrypto.com\/why-bitcoin-wont-fall-below-100k-soon-despite-whale-dumping\/\" rel=\"prev noopener\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\" target=\"_blank\">Why Bitcoin won\u2019t fall below $100K soon, despite whale dumping<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"$3B in crypto options expired on the 16th of May, but next week positioning was somewhat bullish.\u00a0 For&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106771,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[52,51,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-106770","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-ambcrypto","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114518565358079728","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}