Bitcoin gained 0.5% from midnight UTC to approximately $81,700, underperforming altcoins. Ether advanced 0.9%. The CoinDesk 80 (CD80), an altcoin index, increased 0.7%. The memecoin gauge gained 2.9%.
The recovery followed Thursday's technology-led selloff, when the Nasdaq Composite dropped 2.6%, the index's largest decline since June. South Korea's Kospi gained 0.3%. China's CSI 300 advanced 1.7%. Japan's Nikkei 225 declined 0.25%. Traders are watching the Federal Reserve's October 27-28 meeting while Brent crude near $113 sustains concerns about inflation. SoSoValue data showed $635 million leaving U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs on Thursday. The Thursday withdrawals followed inflows exceeding $1 billion during the week's first three days.
Crypto futures volume declined 19% over 24 hours, while liquidations decreased 23%, reversing increases in both measures a day earlier. Open interest increased 1% after yesterday's decline, with bitcoin's price nearly unchanged, indicating that traders were opening positions rather than merely closing positions. The taker-volume split favored shorts at 51.6%, compared with 48.4% for longs. Open-interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta, which measures buying versus selling through market orders, moved from mostly negative readings yesterday, with the weakest near -0.12%, to almost universally within 0.05% of zero today. XAUT was the exception at approximately -0.25%, the most negative reading among tokens, indicating that market selling dominated.
Bitcoin and ether futures open interest each increased approximately 1% while prices barely changed, indicating modest additions to positions. Bitcoin liquidations decreased by approximately two-thirds, while ether liquidations fell by approximately one-third. Bitcoin funding increased from 0.0041% to 0.0067%, raising the cost for longs to maintain positions. Ether funding remained unchanged. BNB and SUI funding turned positive from yesterday's respective readings of -0.0048% and -0.0036%, while DOGE funding also became positive as all three prices rose and funding increased across most leading tokens.
SOL, XRP and DOGE open interest declined by more than price changes alone explained, indicating that traders continued closing positions. ZEC open interest dropped 8% alongside a 1.5% price decline, marking a second day of substantial exits and suggesting capital flight. Gold and silver perpetual futures open interest increased for a second day despite falling prices, while positive funding meant longs were paying to maintain positions. Crude oil perpetual futures open interest increased for a second day alongside a 1.4% price gain, while negative funding meant shorts were paying. Monero's XMR funding returned to normal after the strongest reading on the heatmap earlier in the 24-hour period, easing the previously identified leverage buildup.
Bitcoin's busiest option was the November 27 $98,000 call, followed by the December 25 $88,000 call; five of the six most-active contracts were calls above market prices, and the sole put was the October 30 $76,000 contract. Ether puts occupied the two busiest positions, led by approximately 9,000 contracts in the October 26 $2,200 put. Options volume does not establish whether traders bought or sold the contracts. Ether's one-week 25-delta put-call skew approached 13% after rising since early October, indicating substantially higher prices for puts than calls and growing downside concern. Bitcoin's corresponding skew declined to approximately 4% from a mid-month high near 14%, indicating reduced concern about downside risk.
Pepe advanced 14% to lead the CD100, recording the Ethereum-based frog memecoin's largest gain in a month. Pepe's gains reached 23% over the week and 16% over the month without an identifiable catalyst. However, floki, bonk and shiba inu gained between 3.3% and 4.9% today but remained down as much as 16% over the month. Pepe's 24-hour trading volume reached approximately $353 million, approximately 10% above the comparable time yesterday.
Polkadot and cosmos each advanced more than 5%, taking weekly gains above 6%. However, polkadot remained down 2.5% in October, while cosmos was up 3.6%. DeFi tokens recovered after leading Thursday's losses, with uniswap gaining 3.5% to approximately $7.25 and ethena rising 2.0% to approximately 20 cents. Doublezero and monad, the CD100's weakest monthly performers, rose 2.5% and 4.3%, respectively, but remained down 49% and 31% over the month. CoinMarketCap's Altcoin Season indicator increased to 58/100 from Monday's low of 54/100 as favorable sentiment continued supporting altcoins while bitcoin traded within a narrow range.