Bitcoin derivatives traders are carrying almost $100bn in combined futures and options exposure, with call options accounting for 60.74% of open interest despite bitcoin trading above several major exchanges’ “max pain” levels.
Bitcoin was priced at about $81,273 on Saturday, 19 September, having risen 4.2% in 24 hours. The cryptocurrency moved between $75,038 and $81,710 during the week, while futures open interest stood at approximately $56.3bn and options open interest at about $42bn.
The combined figure represents the amount tied up in open contracts, rather than money directly waiting to be won or lost.
Binance held the largest share of futures open interest, with 144,810 BTC valued at $11.77bn, or 20.89% of the market, according to Coinglass data. CME followed with 107,450 BTC worth $8.74bn and a 15.5% share.
Bybit and Gate each held about $5.36bn, while MEXC had $4.78bn. Hyperliquid accounted for $3.47bn and OKX for $3.12bn, with the remainder distributed among platforms including Bitget, Kucoin, Bitunix and BingX.
Short-term changes in futures positioning were limited. MEXC increased by 0.34%, Bitunix by 0.64%, Bitget by 0.22% and Bybit by 0.17%. Hyperliquid declined by 0.47%, while OKX fell by 0.21%.
The broader trend has been stronger, with aggregate futures open interest rising from well below $50bn in August towards the mid-$50bn range as bitcoin recovered towards $80,000.
Options positioning has tilted towards calls, which provide the right to buy at a set price. Calls represented 311,306.86 BTC, or 60.74% of open interest, while puts accounted for 201,232.2 BTC, or 39.26%.
Calls also made up 59.01% of 24-hour options volume, at 30,277.53 BTC, compared with 21,028.15 BTC in puts. The split suggests demand for upside exposure, although options are also used for hedging and multi-leg strategies and do not provide a definitive market forecast.
On Deribit, the largest September 25 positions included the $70,000 call with 10,916.3 BTC, the $85,000 call with 10,202.3 BTC and the $90,000 call with 9,544.1 BTC. A December 25 $80,000 call held 9,033.7 BTC.
For the September 25 expiry, Deribit also showed 8,641.5 BTC in the $70,000 put and 7,193.4 BTC in the $100,000 call. The $82,000 and $80,000 calls contained 6,922.5 BTC and 6,489.7 BTC respectively.
The busiest contracts included the $85,000 call, with 2,270.9 BTC in 24-hour volume, followed by the $82,000 call at 1,251.1 BTC and the $80,000 call at 797.4 BTC. The $74,000 put recorded 753.3 BTC and the $81,000 call 744 BTC.
Max pain for September 25 was about $72,000 on Deribit, $76,000 on Binance and $75,000 on OKX. Each level was below bitcoin’s current price, although max pain is a positioning measure rather than a prediction.
Later expiry levels vary, with Deribit rising towards roughly $78,000 on some dates before falling towards $60,000 by June 2027.
A wallet linked to BIT, formerly known as Matrixport, also transferred another 1,000 BTC, worth $81.06m, to Binance.
