Bitcoin traded lower as renewed weakness in technology stocks weighed on investor sentiment, with Nvidia shares falling amid reports of a possible leadership shake-up involving CEO Jensen Huang. At the same time, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $299.9 million in additional withdrawals, extending their outflow streak to five consecutive sessions.
Bitcoin (BTC) declined 0.7% from midnight UTC to approximately $73,400, trading close to its daily low as selling pressure spread across the technology sector. Ether (ETH) also slipped 0.5% to around $2,044, while the CoinDesk 80 Index lost 1%. Over the past 24 hours, BTC and ETH were down 0.8% and 0.7%, respectively.
Nvidia was at the center of the latest market turbulence, with its shares dropping roughly 7% in premarket trading. The decline followed reports from The New York Times about an alleged relationship between CEO Jensen Huang and a company executive, alongside a Wall Street Journal report claiming the board was preparing to remove him. Nvidia has not confirmed any decision regarding Huang’s position.
The weakness also affected Nasdaq-100 futures, which fell 0.6%, surrendering part of Wednesday’s gains driven by AI infrastructure company CoreWeave.
Continued institutional withdrawals added another layer of pressure to the cryptocurrency market. Data from SoSoValue showed that U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs experienced $299.9 million in net outflows on Wednesday, marking their fifth straight session of withdrawals. Cumulative outflows since November 5 have reached approximately $1.44 billion.
BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) led the withdrawals, recording $269.7 million in redemptions and extending its negative streak to nine consecutive trading sessions.
Traders are also awaiting U.S. initial jobless claims data, due at 13:30 UTC, while monitoring developments surrounding Nvidia’s board. The Federal Reserve’s December 8–9 policy meeting is another major focus, with CME FedWatch data indicating approximately 90% odds of an interest rate hike.
Crypto Derivatives Market Signals Weaker Participation
Overall futures activity declines: Cryptocurrency futures volume dropped 20.64% over 24 hours to $168.6 billion, while aggregate open interest (OI) decreased 2.92% to $125.8 billion. The decline suggests traders are reducing exposure and closing positions. Total liquidations fell 63.67% to $263.7 million, although long positions accounted for 64.5% of the losses, indicating greater pressure on bullish traders.
Bitcoin futures show continued selling pressure: BTC futures open interest declined 2.9%, compared with a 0.6% decrease in the underlying asset’s price. Trading volume also contracted 27.6%, while cumulative volume delta (CVD) remained negative, indicating that aggressive market orders favored sellers. Funding rates stayed moderately positive, meaning traders holding long positions continued paying shorts. Bitcoin recorded the highest liquidations among cryptocurrencies at $62.9 million.
Ether futures experience sharper volume contraction: ETH derivatives also showed signs of capital leaving the market, with open interest falling 1.8% alongside a 0.6% price decline. Trading volume plunged 37.2%, the largest reduction among major cryptocurrencies. CVD remained neutral, suggesting buying and selling pressure were relatively balanced. Funding rates were moderately positive, indicating that longs continued compensating short positions.
Monero futures funding reaches elevated levels: The annualized average funding rate for Monero (XMR) perpetual futures climbed to approximately 80%, significantly higher than other cryptocurrencies. This indicates that traders maintaining leveraged long positions are paying substantial fees to short sellers. BTC and ETH also recorded positive funding rates, although at considerably lower levels. GRAM, formerly known as Toncoin, remained an exception with negative funding, meaning short traders were paying longs.
Most major cryptocurrencies show negative CVD: Open-interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta remained below zero for Bitcoin and several other leading digital assets. This suggests that market orders continued to favor selling, reflecting cautious sentiment across the derivatives market. GRAM, NEAR, and ZEC were among the few tokens showing positive readings.
Dogecoin and Zcash futures lose capital: Dogecoin (DOGE) futures open interest declined 5.9% as its price dropped 1.5%. Zcash (ZEC) also experienced significant withdrawals, with open interest falling 5.4% despite a smaller 0.4% price decline. However, ZEC’s positive CVD indicated that aggressive market orders still favored buyers despite the reduction in outstanding positions.
Bitcoin options continue favoring downside protection: BTC options skew, which measures the relative cost of put options compared with call options, increased slightly to approximately 11% for one-week contracts. Meanwhile, one-week implied volatility declined to around 35% from 38% on Tuesday, suggesting traders expect somewhat smaller price fluctuations. Four of the six most actively traded contracts were calls, led by the $80,000 strike expiring December 25. The remaining two were put options at $73,000 and $74,000, expiring November 13.
Ether options maintain a bearish tilt: ETH’s one-week options skew increased to approximately 12%, indicating that downside protection remained more expensive than bullish exposure. Four of the six most actively traded contracts were puts, although the $2,200 call expiring November 20 recorded the highest trading activity.
GRAM Leads Gains While DeFi Tokens Struggle
GRAM extends its winning streak: GRAM, the renamed Toncoin, topped the CoinDesk 100 for a second consecutive day, rising 5.2% since midnight UTC. Growing interest in Telegram’s wallet ecosystem has supported the token. Founder Pavel Durov recently announced that more than 700,000 wallets had been created through the application within just 48 hours.
Zcash recovers after recent weakness: ZEC advanced 2.4% following a difficult start to the week. A proposed governance measure seeks to withdraw 50,000 ZEC, worth approximately $50 million, from the Zcash Community Grants treasury. Token holders are expected to vote on the proposal between November 16 and November 30.
Render declines amid Nvidia weakness: Render (RENDER), a decentralized GPU computing network, dropped 3.1% as Nvidia’s share-price decline weighed on sentiment toward AI-related cryptocurrency projects.
Avalanche advances on tokenization developments: AVAX gained 2% as investors continued evaluating Monday’s announcement that a clearing company connected to a proposed NYSE-affiliated tokenized securities platform plans to use Avalanche’s blockchain, pending regulatory approval.
DeFi sector records broader losses: Decentralized finance remained under pressure, with the CoinDesk DeFi Select Index (DFX) declining 1.6%. Aave (AAVE), ether.fi (ETHFI), and Ethena (ENA) fell between 2.5% and 3.3%. Monero performed even worse, dropping 4.5% and becoming the weakest asset in the CoinDesk 100, despite no clear catalyst behind the decline.
Altcoin Season Still Appears Unlikely
Market indicators suggest that a broad recovery across alternative cryptocurrencies remains some distance away.
CoinMarketCap’s Altcoin Season Index declined to 39 out of 100 from 40 in the previous session, remaining well below the 75-point level generally associated with an altcoin season.
At the same time, the Crypto Fear and Greed Index stood at 26, indicating that investors remain firmly in fear territory as uncertainty continues across digital asset markets.
