Here’s Where Speculative Crypto Derivatives Traders Have Been Camping In Crypto Winter

Key Insights

• Crypto derivatives open interest halves, but Binance gold and silver perps attract over $70B in volume.
• Traders pivot to precious metals as Bitcoin volatility fades in crypto winter.
• DerivaDEX earns Bermuda regulatory approval, opening the door for compliant on-chain perps.

The Crypto winter has frozen most markets, but one corner has stayed red-hot: crypto derivatives. While Bitcoin and altcoin perps bleed open interest, investors went full blast on leveraged bets on gold and silver.

The total open interest across crypto derivatives collapsed, shrinking from over $90 billion at last year’s peak to roughly $44 billion now, as per Coinglass data.

Speculative crypto derivatives traders have pulled back hard as prices stagnate and volatility fades. This depicts classic crypto winter behavior, as confirmed by Strategy’s Michael Saylor, where investors sit on the sidelines

Binance Gold and Silver Perps Explode to $70 billion

Despite the drop in overall crypto derivatives volume, the action has not completely vanished. Binance’s Gold and Silver perpetual futures have pulled in over $70 billion in trading volume in just weeks since launch.

Traders now get 24/7 on-chain exposure to precious metals without leaving crypto rails. The shift from crypto to metals reveals how investors have been hedging against the current crypto winter.

The chart spans from late December to mid-February. December saw little to no metals trading on Binance as investors were all focused on crypto. At the time Bitcoin price had dropped from its $126,000 peak, but investors were still hopeful that the downtrend was just a dip.

However, the chart shows a slight pop in leveraged bets in gold and silver from early January. By that time, the reality of a crypto bear market dawned on many investors. From there, the shift happens fast. By early February, volume had skyrocketed to over $30 billion, reflecting a full shift of investors from crypto to metals.

This data is further confirmed by a massive drop in USDT supply, which is on track for its largest monthly decline since the FTX collapse. This is mainly due to the tightening of crypto liquidity as traders rotate into metals for hedging purposes.

DerivaDEX Wins Regulatory Greenlight

While still on the topic of crypto derivatives, DerivaDEX, a DAO-governed derivatives platform, has launched with a test license from the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA).

DerivaDEX is a fully on-chain perpetuals DEX built on the Arbitrum network. The BMA test license allows live trading with real funds under regulatory oversight, a big step beyond pure testnets or unlicensed DeFi.

Co-Founder and General Partner of Electric Capital, Avichal Garg, praised the launch. He noted that DerivaDEX has brought together “high performance execution, on-chain settlement, and a clear regulatory framework.” The same pieces needed to unlock institutional participation at scale

The launch marked the first decentralized exchange run by a DAO to operate under formal regulatory approval. The Bermuda Monetary Authority granting a test license validates the regulatory pathway for DAO-governed crypto exchanges.

Other jurisdictions will likely follow if this model proves successful. The underlying driver here is regulatory arbitrage, which favors innovation outside traditional financial centers.

This is a base development for investors who want on-chain perps without full centralization risk. Institutional flows could follow if the model holds.

Where Investors Are Positioning Now

Crypto winter has forced a pivot. Speculative crypto derivatives traders have not quit; they have rotated. Binance gold and silver derivatives offer leveraged, round-the-clock action on assets that actually move.

DerivaDEX adds a compliant DeFi option for those staying pure on-chain. The $70 billion poured into Binance precious metals perps and DerivaDEX’s fresh license show exactly where the remaining alpha hides.

While core crypto open interest sits at multi-month lows, these corners have stayed lit. Smart money has already camped out.

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