Breaking Down the Effect of Bitcoin’s $3,000 Drop on the Futures Market

• Bitcoin has undergone a strong drop since peaking at $19,500 just days ago
• The coin currently trades at $17,000 as of this article’s writing
• Analysis compiled by Coinalyze found that over the course of the past few days, $1 billion worth of open interest has been wiped from leading Bitcoin futures exchanges
• This was accompanied

How the Strong Bitcoin Drop Affected the Futures Market For BTC

Bitcoin has undergone a strong drop since peaking at $19,500 just days ago. The leading cryptocurrency currently trades for $17,000, far below the highs.

The drop came in a short period of time, with liquidations pushing Bitcoin dramatically lower in a wave. The issue was that many market participants were overleveraged, meaning that a small correction triggered liquidations and stop losses, resulting in a rapid cascade lower.

Analysis compiled by Coinalyze found that over the course of the past few days, $1 billion worth of open interest has been wiped from leading Bitcoin futures exchanges.

This was also marked by a spike in trading volume, of $66 billion on futures exchanges and $7 billion on spot exchanges.

These two data points in tandem suggest that the recent correction marked a needed correction in the Bitcoin market to ensure that derivatives players were not getting too far overleveraged.

$BTC yesterday:

– $1 billion of Open Interest wiped out
– record trading volume: $66 billion on futures and $7 billion on spot
– $900 million longs liquidated
– $1.5 billion longs liquidated on the entire futures market(all coins, all exchanges) pic.twitter.com/8QGOaLMpf6

— Coinalyze (@coinalyzetool) November 27, 2020

After the strong correction, the funding rates of top Bitcoin futures markets have reset. The funding rate is the rate that long positions pay short positions on a recurring basis to make sure the price of the future stays in line with the spot market.

According to ByBt, a crypto derivatives tracker, the funding rates of most leading exchanges have reset to the baseline of 0.01% per eight hours. Further, on OKEx in particular, the funding rates of many pairs have actually trended into a negative region, suggesting an increasing number of short takers.

Bitcoin may revert higher if there continues to be low and even negative interest rates and if consolidation takes place.

Par for the Course

Many say that this correction is par for the course in that it should be expected.

Bob Loukas, a long-time Bitcoin investor and macro analyst, recently pointed out that the previous bull run was punctuated with drawdowns similar to the one taking place now:

“Most have a short memory. Remember in Jan 2017 just shy of #Bitcoin ATH’s, boom 34% decline. The 2 months later a sharp rally, new ATH’s, and double boom 34% decline. Never a one way street.”

Countless others in the space have corroborated this, arguing that it is actually healthy for bullish markets to pull back.

Featured Image from Shutterstock
Price tags: xbtusd, btcusd, btcusdt
Charts from TradingView.com
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