Crypto Crash: October Bearishness Hits Hard, Altcoins Crushed Underfoot

by

Finance

What to know:

  • BTC futures open interest sits like a stubborn old man at $25B, while negative funding rates on Binance and OKX show that traders are leaning short like they always do during a dip. Stability? Sure, but don’t get too comfy.
  • A strange spike in the 1-week 25 Delta Skew to 12.6% suggests traders are forking out more for calls, probably hoping for a miracle rally, despite the market being in total freefall.
  • TAO, ASTER, and LDO took a 12% plunge. Meanwhile, TRX decided to be the rebel of the day, creeping up like the little engine that could. Meanwhile, liquidity is as thin as my patience at this point.

The crypto market endured yet another soul-crushing sell-off on Thursday, with altcoins cratering like they were the Titanic and the iceberg had just arrived. BTC and ETH are starting to flirt with support levels, like they’re trying to decide if they want to dive deeper into despair or just hang around for a bit.

Looks like the bear market’s having a lovely dinner party, continuing its grim feast from last weekend’s $500 billion bloodbath. Traders are now treading cautiously, as if walking on eggshells, to avoid triggering another liquidation parade. Lovely, isn’t it?

Derivatives Positioning

  • The BTC futures market, ever the stalwart, stays firm at around $25 billion in Open Interest. The 3-month annualized basis is calm, like a smooth sea-at least for now. But don’t be fooled by that peaceful surface. Binance and OKX’s negative funding rates of -2% to -3% scream that many are betting on the bear, despite the otherwise steady state.
  • The BTC options market, however, flashes a curious signal. The 24-hour Put/Call Volume balance gives us a peek into the minds of traders, but the real kicker is the 1-week 25 Delta Skew spiking to 12.62%. That tells us traders are throwing money at call options like they’re bidding for the last lifeboat on a sinking ship. They’re gearing up for a surge, or so they hope.
  • According to Coinglass, there’s been a tidy $415 million in liquidations over the past 24 hours. The 70-30 split between longs and shorts is like a strange party where no one really wants to be there. ETH ($115 million), BTC ($80 million), and others ($43 million) are the top culprits of this liquidation spree. A big liquidation level to keep an eye on? $110,009, thanks to Binance’s liquidation heatmap.

Token Talk

By Oliver Knight

  • Altcoins, once again, found themselves at the mercy of a relentless sell-off. It’s like they have a target on their back, and no one’s missing. TAO, ASTER, and LDO all tumbled between 12% and 13% in the last 24 hours. The “altcoin season” index on CoinMarketCap slumped to a pathetic 27/100, the lowest in three months. Ouch.
  • Bitcoin and Ethereum are still sitting at their respective support levels, $110,000 and $4,000. But the mood has shifted-call it the bear market blues-since the market couldn’t shake off last weekend’s $500 billion wipeout.
  • But hold on, there’s a twist! Enter TRX, the brave little altcoin that managed to crawl its way up from intraday lows of $0.312 to $0.322. Will it recover? It might-if it doesn’t get run over in the next sell-off.
  • The reasons behind this sell-off are as predictable as a bad movie plot. Long-term Bitcoin holders are distributing, creating an environment where selling pressure is high and demand is low-talk about the worst kind of cocktail.
  • As always, altcoins suffer the most when Bitcoin stumbles. Liquidity, as usual, is a joke, which means the slightest market hiccup sends prices crashing through support levels like a wrecking ball. It’s a classic case of chaos.

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2025-10-16 20:52