Bitcoin traded sideways on Friday, holding within a narrow band as derivatives metrics pointed to easing momentum, while altcoins delivered mixed performance and Zcash saw a pickup in bullish activity.
BTC remained range-bound between $77,500 and $78,500 since midnight UTC, reflecting a drop in volatility. The consolidation comes after a failed push toward $80,000 earlier in the week. Despite the pause, the broader trend remains intact, with bitcoin continuing to form higher highs and higher lows throughout April.
Ethereum mirrored bitcoin’s movement, declining around 0.9% over the same period while staying confined within a tight range.
In traditional markets, U.S. stock futures were mixed. Nasdaq 100 futures rose 0.5% on strong tech earnings, while S&P 500 futures slipped slightly. The U.S. Dollar Index remained steady despite remarks from Donald Trump confirming a three-week extension of the Israel-Lebanon ceasefire. The dollar had weakened when the truce was first announced earlier this month.
In derivatives markets, bitcoin futures open interest fell by more than 6% over the past 24 hours to 744,300 BTC, suggesting traders are unwinding leveraged positions after the rally lost traction below $80,000. Additional signals reinforce this cooling trend: the open interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta has turned negative, indicating sellers are in control, while funding rates remain slightly negative, pointing to a bias toward short positions.
Futures activity across major altcoins such as ETH, SOL, and XRP remained muted. Zcash, however, stood out, with open interest rising nearly 7.5% to a 10-day high and trading volume jumping 80%. Positive cumulative volume delta and funding rates highlight strong buying interest and bullish positioning in the token.
Even as BTC and ETH prices softened, the broader market appears to view the move as a temporary pause. This is reflected in declining implied volatility, with bitcoin’s 30-day volatility index falling to 42%—its lowest since late January—while ether’s dropped below 65%, also marking a multi-month low.
Options data from Deribit continues to signal caution, with risk reversals skewed toward put options across maturities. This suggests ongoing downside hedging alongside strategies like covered call selling to capture limited upside volatility.
Among sector indices, the CoinDesk Memecoin Index was the only one to post gains, edging slightly higher, while DeFi and computing indices each declined around 1%. Within DeFi, tokens such as LDO and MORPHO led losses, falling between 3% and 3.8% as sentiment remains pressured following the $290 million KelpDAO exploit last weekend.
Zcash gave back a small portion of its gains on Friday but remained up more than 7% over the past 24 hours, supported by its recent listing on Robinhood.
Meanwhile, CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season Index ticked up to 39 out of 100, pointing to a modest return of speculative interest as bitcoin continues to consolidate.
