$2B Bitcoin Options Expiry Likely Spares Spot Markets

Around 25,000 Bitcoin options contracts are set to expire on Friday, May 15, with a notional value of roughly $2 billion. While this sounds like a large number, the event is relatively small compared to overall market activity and is unlikely to have any significant impact on spot prices.

Crypto prices took a mid-week dip after the US inflation report but started recovering slightly on Friday. Since Monday, about $25 billion in total market capitalization has exited the space.

Bitcoin Options Expiry Details

This week’s batch of Bitcoin options contracts has a put/call ratio of 0.55. That means there are almost twice as many sellers of long positions as shorts. According to data from Coinglass, the max pain point—where most options expire worthless for buyers—is around $80,000. Current spot prices are a little higher, so some contracts could be out of the money at expiry.

Open interest (OI), or the value of Bitcoin options contracts yet to expire, remains highest at the $80,000 strike price on Deribit, with $1.68 billion. But bears still hold $1.2 billion in OI at the $60,000 strike. Total BTC options OI across all exchanges has been steadily climbing this month and now sits at $38 billion, according to Coinglass.

Deribit commented: “Compared to last week, expiry size has grown materially while put/call ratios moved even lower, showing traders continue rotating toward upside exposure.”

Beyond Bitcoin, around 274,500 Ethereum contracts are also expiring today, with a notional value of $625 million. Ethereum’s max pain is at $2,300, and its put/call ratio is 0.39. Total ETH options OI across all exchanges is approximately $7.3 billion.

Spot Market Outlook

Total cryptocurrency market capitalization rose 1.7% on the day to $2.77 trillion. There could be some added volatility today as the US CLARITY Act advanced out of the Senate Banking Committee in a 15-9 bipartisan vote on Thursday. The past six weeks have seen steady gains, with markets increasing by 16%.

Bitcoin recovered from its Thursday dip below $80,000 but failed to break resistance at $82,000. It fell back below $81,000 again during Friday’s Asian trading session.

Ethereum is showing little recovery, failing to break above $2,300 and falling back to $2,265 at the time of writing. Some altcoins are faring a bit better, with positive moves for XRP, Hyperliquid, Zcash, and Canton.

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