Investors are pulling money out of U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs for the second day in a row, and Binance clients are withdrawing funds after the exchange's restart. $399 million left the funds on Monday, and $4.72 billion has left Binance since Sunday. Bitcoin, meanwhile, is worth around $76,900.
What a spot Bitcoin ETF is. It is an exchange-traded fund that holds real Bitcoin. Its shares trade on a U.S. exchange, and you can buy them like an ordinary stock.
Why this matters to a trader. Big money is leaving, while the price is holding steady for now. All the nervousness has moved into derivatives: volumes and liquidations have soared, and volatility has risen.
Who exactly was withdrawing money?
According to Farside Investors, Monday's outflow from spot Bitcoin ETFs was the second in a row. Almost the entire decline came from a single fund.
- $399 million - outflow across all spot Bitcoin ETFs for the day
- minus $405 million - IBIT from BlackRock, the largest daily outflow since June
- plus a little - the other funds even added a bit in total
What happened with Binance?
$4.72 billion net was withdrawn from the exchange since operations resumed on Sunday. Sunday alone accounted for $3.64 billion.
- A $6.4 billion hack. The FBI pointed to the TraderTraitor group; the DPRK denies involvement.
- Coverage from SAFU. The exchange used roughly half of the Bitcoin in its insurance fund, about $580 million.
Why isn't the price falling?
BTC is up 0.2% since midnight UTC after touching $76,300 in the morning in Europe. ETH rose 0.6% to $2,263.66.
But derivatives are hot.
- +51% to $168.1 billion - futures volume over 24 hours
- +171% to $382.6 million - liquidations
- -1.63% to $134.9 billion - open interest
Liquidations are forced closures of leveraged positions. Open interest is the sum of all open futures positions.
What is the options market expecting?
Expected volatility on the nearest BTC options has risen to about 51% from 43.5%. For ETH the figure is around 59%.
Four of the six most-traded Bitcoin options are puts, i.e. bets on a decline. The fear and greed index has dropped to 34 out of 100, which is the fear zone.
Key point: money is leaving the funds, and the risk has flowed into leverage. With liquidations like these, a sharp price move can come without any new trigger.
What's next on the calendar?
- November 3. U.S. midterm elections.
- November 4. Expiry of the nearest BTC options.
- November 6. U.S. employment report.
It's handy to keep macro data dates in view in the economic calendar.
Have you been watching these outflows from the sidelines?
When $405 million leaves a single fund in a day, and almost five billion leaves an exchange, it's not retail accounts that move the market. You see it, you read the numbers, sometimes you guess the direction. But you take home only as much as your deposit allows. Prop firms close exactly that gap: a paid selection process, then the company's trading nominal and an agreed share of the profit. A week like this is better met when you already understand how that mechanism works.