Ever wake up, check your phone, and wonder if the crypto market is about to pull a Cirque du Soleil back-flip before you’ve even brewed coffee? Yeah, same. So let’s talk about why $17 billion worth of Bitcoin and Ether options expiring today (June 27, 2025) has traders either pacing or partying.
Wait, Did Someone Just Say Seventeen Billion Dollars?
I did, and it still looks absurd on my screen. According to Deribit’s morning data blast, we’re looking at roughly 94,000 BTC contracts (give or take) with a notional near $12 billion and another 1.2 million ETH contracts clocking in around $5 billion. Most of that open interest sits on Deribit, with OKX and CME trailing but still chunky.
For context, a typical monthly expiry four years ago was maybe a tenth of this. Remember when we thought 2021’s $4B quarterly expiry was dramatic? Cute.
Here’s What Actually Happened Overnight
Asia woke up first (as usual) and volatility – or lack thereof – had folks scratching heads. Implied vols on the weekly BTC IV surface fell to 34%, the lowest June print since 2019, even with CPI numbers dropping yesterday. Translation: traders aren’t paying up for crash protection right now. That feels… optimistic? Maybe complacent. I’m torn.
Meanwhile, spot BTC has been camped between $60.2k and $61.7k all week. Ether has been glued around $3,350. The technical nerds on TradingView keep screaming “compression coil!” like it’s a Marvel villain. Could be.
Now Here’s the Interesting Part – Max Pain & Who’s Hurting
Deribit flashes the BTC max pain level (that price where both call and put buyers suffer equally) at roughly $60k. ETH’s max pain hovers around $3,300. Unsurprisingly, the market is trolling within $200 of both marks right now. If price stays here until 08:00 UTC, countless gamma scalpers will pop champagne, while many degens who YOLO-ed far-out-of-the-money calls may discover that the only moon they’re visiting is in Photoshop.
"We haven’t seen a skew this flat into a $10B+ BTC expiry since late ’22," – Amberdata analyst Sophia Nguyen told me on Telegram, punctuating every other sentence with 🚀 emojis.
I love her energy, but I’m suspicious when everyone expects nothing to happen. Markets like to punish consensus.
Tangent Time: Remember March 2020?
I can’t resist the throwback. Back then, I sold some weeklies thinking ‘surely the Fed will step in early.’ They didn’t – at least not until my stop-loss got vaporized. Point is, complacency is kryptonite. Today feels eerily calm – too calm.
So, What Could Actually Move the Needle Today?
- A big whale rolls positions forward. If one of the known Alameda-esque desks (yeah, they’re still around under new names) decides to push size into July, we could see sudden spot demand.
- An ETF rebalancing rumor. BlackRock’s iBTC files its quarterly update next week. If someone leaks an unexpected inflow figure, the tape will react instantly.
- Macro spillover. The U.S. PCE inflation report drops in three hours. A hot print = bond yields up = risk assets wobble. Options expiry could amplify that wobble.
Why This Matters for Your Portfolio (Even If You Hate Options)
Here’s my plain-English spiel: when $17 billion in optionality disappears, market-makers de-hedge. If they were long gamma, they’ll buy back less spot; if short gamma, they might nuke spot into thin liquidity. Either way, post-expiry price action often exaggerates moves. I’ve noticed Sundays after a monster Friday expiry can feel like a drunken seesaw.
In my experience, sitting on the sidelines with staggered limit orders (aka “bid the blood” and “sell the euphoria” levels) beats fomo-ing into the first candle you see on Crypto Twitter.
Quick Hits You Might’ve Missed While Scrolling TikTok
- MicroStrategy added another 12,000 BTC yesterday at an average of $61,050. Saylor truly doesn’t care about max pain charts.
- MakerDAO shipped its Endgame upgrade on mainnet last night. DAI stability fee to drop 0.25% in two weeks, according to Rune’s latest forum rant.
- zkSync airdrop claim window ends today at 23:59 UTC. Don’t be that friend who forgets and complains on Monday.
Okay, So What Am I Doing?
If you’re curious (and hey, this is not advice), I shaved 15% off my BTC stack into USDC yesterday just to have dry powder. I’ve also got laddered bids from $57.8k down to $55k because history loves over-corrections. ETH? Holding, mostly because the Shanghai++ staking unlock has proven to be a nothing-burger and L2 fees keep falling.
Could I be wrong? Absolutely. I’ve been wrong before and I’ll proudly do it again. But at least it won’t be for lack of preparing a plan.
Bottom Line and a Tiny Pep Talk
If we survive this expiry without fireworks, expect volatility to compress even more heading into the July 4th U.S. holiday lull. That’s usually when some hacker decides to rug a mid-cap protocol and wake everyone up. Keep alerts on, refill the coffee, and as always, don’t trade with rent money.
Catch you on the next block.
