Bitcoin recovered from its Asian-session low and traded near $86,000 as falling crude prices and stronger stock markets helped improve sentiment toward risk assets.
Bitcoin was recently priced at $86,008.15 after briefly slipping toward $85,000 during Asian trading. The cryptocurrency broke above its May high with conviction on Monday, strengthening its recent upward momentum. The CoinDesk 20 Index also advanced 2.2% over the past 24 hours.
Institutional demand has provided another boost. U.S.-listed spot bitcoin ETFs recorded nearly $1 billion in net inflows Monday, their strongest one-day performance since October last year.
Oil prices moved in the opposite direction. WTI futures fell more than 2% below $90 a barrel, extending their retreat from a recent high of $106. The decline followed a Kyodo report saying Iran could reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days if the U.S. eased its blockade.
Cheaper crude could reduce inflationary pressure and potentially limit expectations for further Federal Reserve rate increases. Lower energy costs have also helped improve sentiment across risk markets.
Alex Kuptsikevich, chief market analyst at FxPro, said the crypto market benefited from a sharp rise in the Nasdaq, alongside lower oil prices and U.S. government bond yields, stronger global stocks and optimism over U.S.-China negotiations.
The rally has spread beyond bitcoin. PEPE, DOGE and SHIB were among the 10 best-performing cryptocurrencies over the previous 24 hours as traders shifted toward smaller and more speculative assets. Strong memecoin gains are often associated with rising risk appetite and speculative trading.
Futures Market Shows Short-Covering Pressure
Crypto derivatives activity increased sharply over the past day. Total futures volume jumped 38% to $292 billion, while open interest rose only 1% to $157 billion. The resulting volume-to-OI ratio approached 2.
At the same time, approximately $768 million in crypto positions were liquidated, with shorts accounting for most of the forced closures. The combination suggests that short covering has played a significant role in the latest price advance.
Bitcoin futures open interest has nevertheless been rising with the market. OI reached 716,000 BTC, the highest level since Aug. 25, although it remains below the roughly 750,000 BTC average recorded between April and July.
Ethereum and Solana have not seen the same increase in leverage. Despite ETH outperforming bitcoin this quarter, ether futures OI has continued the downward trend that began in May. SOL has displayed a similar pattern.
XRP futures open interest, however, climbed to 2.46 billion tokens from 2.2 billion within 24 hours. The increase mirrors bitcoin’s direction, although XRP’s positioning remains based on a smaller level.
CoinGlass data also show differences in whale positioning. The 24-hour whale bias is bearish for XRP, DOGE and gold, while bitcoin is classified as extremely bullish and ETH and SOL as bullish. Whale activity represents only one component of market positioning, but the divergence coincides with BTC’s stronger performance against those assets.
Cumulative volume delta remains negative for BTC, ETH, XRP and SOL when adjusted for open interest. This indicates that aggressive futures selling has exceeded aggressive buying even as prices moved higher. Most other major cryptocurrencies show the same pattern, with TRX among the exceptions.
That setup supports the view that short covering has contributed significantly to the rally rather than the move being driven entirely by new long positions. CVD remains an exchange-dependent and noisy indicator, however, and should not be considered independently.
Dogecoin’s derivatives activity stands out among the major tokens. DOGE open interest increased 10% in 24 hours, the largest rise among the top 10 cryptocurrencies. Rising leverage in meme tokens can reflect growing speculative interest and has historically appeared during periods of heightened short-term market speculation.
Volatility measures remain relatively calm despite the rally. The 30-day annualized implied volatility indexes BVIV and EVIV are still within recent ranges and well below their February and early-June peaks.
Laser Digital reported that the options volatility curve has flattened since last week as realized volatility increased and the correlation between spot prices and volatility turned positive.
Deribit’s front-end risk reversals also shifted toward calls for both bitcoin and ether late Monday as BTC moved above $85,000. That bias has eased somewhat since then. Calls provide upside exposure, while puts are generally used for downside protection.
The most actively traded BTC options over the past 24 hours were calls at the $95,000 and $90,000 strikes. ETH call activity was concentrated between $2,500 and $3,000.
ZetaChain Holders Vote to Leave Cosmos for Solana
ZetaChain holders have voted to wind down the blockchain and migrate the ZETA token to Solana, though another governance vote is required before the transition can take place.
ZetaChain launched in 2023 after securing $27 million in funding. Its original purpose was to facilitate transfers between blockchains that otherwise could not easily communicate without intermediaries.
The ZETA token currently ranks around No. 313 by market value, with a capitalization of roughly $90 million.
The shutdown proposal received more than 99% support on Sunday, with voter participation reaching 58%. That was well above the 40% participation threshold required for approval.
The decision reflects the ongoing costs associated with maintaining an independent blockchain. ZetaChain uses the Cosmos SDK, a shared software framework used by multiple networks. Vulnerabilities affecting the underlying toolkit can therefore require coordinated fixes across different blockchain operators.
Cosmos Labs disclosed attacks in August involving six chains using related software, resulting in about $6 million in stolen funds. ZetaChain was not attacked, but the incident underscored the maintenance and security challenges cited by its developers.
The planned migration is also connected to Anuma, an AI application developed by the ZetaChain team and launched in February. The app is designed to retain user context between different AI models, and its developers say it has more than 300,000 users.
Moving to Solana would give Anuma access to an ecosystem with established users, wallets and exchange listings, potentially reducing the need for users to bridge into ZetaChain.
Under the proposed structure, ZETA holders would lock their tokens and receive credits usable within Anuma. The arrangement would effectively shift ZETA’s function from representing participation in a blockchain network toward prepaid access to the application.
ZETA doubled from roughly 4 cents ahead of Sunday’s vote to reach 7 cents before giving back some gains. The token was recently down 16% over 24 hours at just under 6 cents.
Daily trading volume reached almost $117 million against a market capitalization of about $90 million, meaning more than the token’s entire market value changed hands during the session.
