Bitcoin (BTC) has been unable to close above $32,000 for the past 28 days, frustrating bulls and pushing the Fear and Greed index to bearish levels below 10. Even with June 6’s small boost, the tech-heavy Nasdaq stock market index is down 24% year-to-date.
Investors who keep a close eye on regulatory development were possibly scared after New York state made clear its intention to regulate the crypto industry, including Bitcoin mining.
On June 2, New York Attorney General Attorney Letitia James issued an investor alert against “risky cryptocurrency investments,” citing the assets’ volatility. According to Cointelegraph, the attorney general is convinced that crypto investments create “more pain than gain” for investors.
The New York State Senate approved a proof-of-work (PoW) mining ban on June 2 and the proposed controversial bill aims to prohibit any new mining operations in the state for the next two years and is now headed for the governor’s desk.
Interestingly, as all of this takes place, Bitcoin derivatives traders have never been so bullish, according to one metric.
Margin traders are extremely bullish
Margin trading allows investors to leverage their positions by borrowing stablecoins and using the proceeds to buy more cryptocurrency. When those savvy traders borrow Bitcoin, they use the coins as collateral for shorts, meaning they are betting on a price decrease.
That is why some analysts monitor the total lending amounts of Bitcoin and stablecoins to gain insight into whether investors are leaning bullish or bearish. Interestingly, Bitfinex margin traders entered their highest ever leverage long (bull) position on June 6.Bitfinex margin traders are known for creating position contracts of 20,000 BTC or higher in a very short time, indicating the participation of whales and large arbitrage desks.
Notice that the longs (bull) indicator vastly increased in mid-May and currently stands at 90,090 BTC contracts, its highest-ever registry. To understand how severe this movement was, one might compare it to the June–July 2021 previous all-time high of 54,500 BTC contracts in longs.
These traders hit the bullseye as their bullish positions peaked right as Bitcoin price bottomed. Over the subsequent months, they could sell those long (bull) contracts at a profit, reducing the number of open long positions (blue line).
Comments
Post a Comment