Ethereum Funding Rates Hit The Low Amid The Shift From PoW

The Ethereum upgrade has shifted the network from Proof-of-Work (PoW) to Proof-of-Stake (PoS). The Ethereum mainnet and the Beacon Chain will finally merge as a single blockchain through the transition.

According to the estimations of EtherNodes, the Ethereum transition will occur if there are no underlying technical challenges. Before now, the team of developers confirmed the checklist for the Merge before releasing it.

There have been several sentiments and reactions concerning the Merge lately. This significantly impacted ETH and all its derivatives in the crypto market. Some participants are accumulating more expecting a sudden spike in price. But some are even disposing of what they have due to fear of volatility.

Sentiments On Merge Affects ETH Funding Rates

Currently, expectations and more attention are glued to the Ethereum blockchain. But based on the state of the miners, there could be variation in the transition estimated time. From the look of things, the ETH futures traders seem to be calculating their moves.

The data from CryptoQuant revealed that Ethereum funding rates had hit a new all-time low. This recent point marks the lowest for the Ether derivatives.

ETH funding rate is a metric that provides forced convergence of prices between the contract and the underlying asset. It indicates the payment that comes from long to short or short to long traders. The difference between an asset’s spot and the perpetual futures contract prices provides the funding rate.

Negative Value For Ethereum Funding Rates And Implication

CryptoQuant data give a negative value for the Ethereum funding rates. This means that the dominant force in the order book goes to short traders. Hence, will be paying long traders accordingly.

Futures traders place high importance on funding rates. This is because these rates are like spontaneous catalysts that could alter their trading stance positively or negatively. As a result, they will make huge profits or suffer massive losses.

Usually, traders that pay high funding while using high leverage will likely have losses. However, such a flip is possible to occur even when the market is not under a severe bearish influence. So, they may resort to hedging as protection.

Ethereum expected to surge l Source: ETHUSDT on TradingView.com

The negative value of the ETH funding rates implies that futures traders are currently hedging their spot exposure. A considerable explanation for such results points to the Merge. Hence, the traders could exercise more caution due to potential volatility that could erupt after the transition.

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Bitcoin Marks 9th Consecutive Month Of Sluggish Funding Rates

Bitcoin funding rates for the past two months have entered one of their worst streaks yet. During this time, there have been no positive funding rates, and the best that the market has seen has been funding rates at a neutral level. However, even now, reaching neutral levels have proved incredibly hard for funding rates, taking a deeper dive with each passing week.

Funding Rates Remain Below Neutral

The last time bitcoin funding rates had been in the neutral territory had been at the beginning of August. Since then, funding rates have consistently returned below neutral, with some short-term lows being recorded along the way. Funding rates on crypto exchange Binance have actually dropped to 2-month lows at this point. Additionally, the crypto exchange has now hit nine months of funding rates at or below neutral levels.

This puts the perpetual swaps at a continuously lower rate compared to spot market prices. Bitcoin traders have since been reducing their risk exposure to the digital asset, and this has come as a culmination of such wariness.

Funding rates remain below neutral | Source: Arcane Research

It is the most bearish that the market has been since the bull market was triggered in 2020. This even comes despite the fact that bitcoin open interest has been seeing higher levels. On Tuesday, the bitcoin funding rates sat at around 0.00% and had touched a 2-month low earlier in the week.

Bitcoin Open Interest Grows

Bitcoin open interest has maintained a consistent growth rate despite the funding rates taking a nosedive at each possible point. Each week has seen open interest either hit a new all-time high or come close to reaching it. The former was the case last week.

BTC trading below $20,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

This time around, open interest had a brand new all-time high of 398,075 BTC on August 29th. This is more than 2% of the total BTC circulating supply. It is up significantly from its lowest point last year of 186,158 BTC, representing a more than 110% growth in this time.

With the open interest so high and funding rates so low, it leaves room for the possibility of a short squeeze. This unusual market has not been ignored by investors, leading them to take up more conservative positions.

Bitcoin’s price has also not been encouraging. After hitting a new local high of $25,000 about a week ago, the digital asset is now struggling to hold above $20,000.

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Bitcoin Funding Rates Turn Positive, Why The Rally May Not Be Over

Bitcoin funding rates had fallen below neutral two weeks ago after finally recovering from a month-long downtrend. This had sparked fears of another bearish trend starting in the market. However, this has quickly changed as the numbers for last week have come in. This time around, the bitcoin funding rates are painting a better picture for the digital asset.

Funding Rates Return To Neutral

The bitcoin funding rates for the last week have been more optimistic compared to previous weeks. This is because it had continued to maintain its positive at neutral for the whole seven days; there was not a single point in the week that funding rates had actually fallen below neutral. This is the first time since March that the funding rates have consistently remained above the negative level for a while week.

A recovery in funding rates is always a welcome change for the market, this is why last week’s day remains important. With a market such as this, where bitcoin continues to struggle to comfortably break above $23,000, there needs to be a significant change in not only sentiment but in the amount of money being injected into the space.

BTC funding rates return to neutral | Source: Arcane Research

With funding rates recovering to neutral, it once more puts it on a path towards becoming neutral, something that has eluded bitcoin for most of the year so far. The trend, which had started in June, has now reached an acceptable point, but the end game remains for finding rates to turn positive if bitcoin is to continue on a bull rally.

BTC trading below $23,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com
Will Bitcoin Recover?

Bitcoin is still trending at $22,800, which has surprisingly become a support level for the digital asset. This level continues to hold tentatively but needs a big push to rise out of this level. With funding rates recovering, perp traders may likely provide that needed push.

Related Reading: Why Bitcoin Investors Should Pay Attention To The Macro Environment

As for the leverage in the bitcoin market, it remains elevated. This means that more traders are opening positions in the digital asset. But it also puts them in a precarious position in a situation where liquidations could pile up quickly, especially with a move below $22,000.

Nonetheless, the bull indicators remain strong, albeit a bit weaker compared to last week. The resistance at $23,000 is not as strong as bears would like, which puts the next major resistance well above $23,500. If bitcoin can beat the 50-day moving average once more, then it is likely to surge above $24,000 once more.

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Elevated Bitcoin Open Interest Levels Puts Market In Vulnerable Position

Bitcoin has recovered above $23,000 multiple times now, but the digital asset remains in a perilous position. This is because the recovery alone has not been able to assure that the bull trend would endure. Rather, it has been falling the brief buying and selling pressures that have been plaguing investors in recent times. The bitcoin open interest also mirrors this fact and shows just how easy it would be for bitcoin to lose its position.

Bitcoin Open Interest Stays Elevated

For the past week, the bitcoin open interest has been on the rise. After hitting above 300k the previous week, there was no stopping this part of the market. However, it also pointed to more peculiarities about the current bitcoin uptrend.

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For one, the elevated bitcoin-denominated open interest shows that there is very high leverage in the crypto market. As with any market, having such high leverage always puts the value of the digital asset in a perilous position. It could swing either way resulting in a short squeeze or a long squeeze. Whatever the case may end up being, the results are often the same; there are significant price swings that would go in either direction.

BTC recovers above $23,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

With the current movement of bitcoin, it is more likely that a long squeeze would be the end of it. This would likely see the price drop back down and touch $20,000. But if the off chance that it does end in a short squeeze, then bitcoin’s price could very well revisit $25,000.

Funding Rates Fall

Last week, the market had seen some much-needed bullish sentiment on the part of perpetual traders when the funding rates had recovered to neutral levels. Given that the funding rates had spent weeks swinging below neutral, this was a welcome change, however briefly.

It would seem the positive recovery would only last a single week as bitcoin funding rates have begun to swing back into the negative. It shows a straight decline down from neutral, indicating that traders were returning to more careful trades.

Funding rates fall below neutral | Source: Arcane Research

Interestingly, though, is the fact that despite the decline in the funding rates, they still continue to maintain higher lows. It shows better prospects compared to the month of June, which was characterized by funding rates remaining perpetually below neutral.

Related Reading | Bullish Sentiment Spills Over To Institutional Investors As Ethereum Inflows Balloons

What this shows is that although bitcoin traders are being more careful, they have not entirely written off the digital asset. This improvement in market sentiment has shone through in bitcoin’s recent recovery. However, for this to continue, funding rates would need a reversal from here.

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Funding Rates Return To Neutral Following Bitcoin Relief Rally

Bitcoin funding rates had seen a very negative month between mid-June and mid-July. The funding rates, which had previously remained muted, quickly declined below neutral and proceeded to spend the next one month on this level. However, there is a significant change as last week saw funding rates return to neutral.

Funding Rate Recovers On Exchanges

The bitcoin funding rates had been touching low points as the price of the digital asset struggled. This was concerning given that funding rates were expected to improve as the digital asset began to basically trade at what was described as a “discount.” This would not be farther from the truth, as funding rates fell to their lowest points this June. It indicated that perp traders were still bearish on the cryptocurrency and refrained from moving in.

Related Reading | Bitcoin Dominance Dives As Ethereum Takes Up More Space

Last week would come with good news as funding rates returned to neutral and stayed there. Binance and Bybit crypto exchanges both recorded funding rate levels of 0.01%. The return to neutral came as the price of bitcoin started a relief rally that saw it break above $23,000.

Funding rates return to neutral | Source: Arcane Research 

Open interest had also followed the same route, although it retraced during the week when the price fell once more. It showed that there is still a lot of leveraging going on in the market since the bitcoin open interest was not much different from what was recorded the prior week, even with the decline.

Bitcoin Traders Turning Bullish

The recovery of bitcoin funding rates to a neutral level is a testament to the returning positive sentiment among traders and investors. It definitely does not signal that the market has returned to its previously bullish phase, but it is an indication that investors are now looking favorably at the bitcoin and crypto market at large.

BTC retraces downwards | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

It tracks along with the Fear & Greed index which has now moved out of the ‘Extreme Fear’ territory for the first time in almost three months. It saw an incredible bounce from last week’s sentiment, with a score of 18 putting it in extreme fear. Although the market is still fearful, the recovery is seeing faith return to the market. It is also evidenced in the buying pressure that has been building this week. 

Related Reading | Domino Effect On Stablecoins Leads To Reversal Of Growth Trend

The correlation of the funding rates with the price of bitcoin can either be good or bad from here on out, depending on how well the cryptocurrency performs in the market. If it continues its recovery trend, then funding rates may return above neutral for the first time in more than two months.

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Bitcoin Funding Rates Are Climbing As Price Continues To Struggle

Bitcoin has been struggling over the last couple of weeks and funding rates have responded in different ways to the price. Instead of a rise in funding rates when the price had begun to plummet, they had stayed muted and had even begun to decline, especially during the past week. However, this is changing as the price of the digital asset has begun to take a turn for the better.

Funding Rates Recover

Bitcoin funding rates declined to one of their lowest points last month and this had been when the price of the digital asset had been higher. At that point, long traders remained relaxed, opting to stay out of the market while the crash raged on. This has now changed given that long traders have begun to move into the market.

Related Reading | Altcoins Take The Lead As Bitcoin Struggles To Hold Above $20,000

Funding rates across Binance and Bybit crypto exchanges have been showing a good recovery trend over the last week. Although it remains below neutral, it is close to reclaiming this level. Bybit has seen its bitcoin perpetuals recover to 0.01% over the past weekend. Binance still remains in the negative territory but a total average of the two has returned an average of 0.003% in the perps market. 

It is obvious that long traders are now rousing from their slumber. This time around, it is with tremendous vigor as evidenced by the growth rate recorded over this time period, going from negative to positive so quickly.

Funding rates begin recovery | Source: Arcane Research

There is no telling if this recovery trend will continue in the new week or if this is just a one-off. However, if it turns out to be the former, then the current recovery in the price of bitcoin may not be a short-lived one after all.

Bitcoin Bouncing Back

After a gut-wrenching month of June, July has big better tidings for the digital asset. Now, it has not been as good as investors were hoping but bitcoin has been having better luck holding on to its $20,000 support level compared to a couple of weeks back.

Related Reading | SEC Still Against Spot-based Bitcoin ETFs. Is There A Light At The End Of The Tunnel?

This week, the digital asset has recovered a good chunk and has been close to testing the $21,000 resistance level once more. It still remains under key technical levels but the return in positive sentiment shows that there may be more recovery to come.

BTC continues recovery trend | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

As bitcoin funding rates recover and long traders become more active, it will be no surprise if bitcoin were to test the $22,500. An unlikely level as of now but doable as long as the sell-off fatigue holds in the market.

Bitcoin is trading at $20,860 at the time of this writing. It remains the largest cryptocurrency with a market cap of $398 billion.

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Leading Crypto Exchanges See Negative Funding Rates, Have The Bears Taken Over?

Prices have been declining across the crypto market and with it has come to a lot of doubt on the part of investors. This is reflected in the deposit and withdrawal trends recorded across the various crypto exchanges. One of these has been the funding rates which had remained flat for the better part of the first half of 2022. However, there has now been some movement in the funding rates and it is unfortunately not for the better.

Funding Rates Turn Negative

Two leading crypto exchanges have seen negative crypto funding rates for the past week. Binance and ByBit consistently appear on the top of the list for the exchanges with the most trading volume and have become a natural home for perpetual traders. That is why changes across these platforms can be significant to market movements.

Related Reading | Holding Back The Bears: Why Bitcoin Must Break $22,500

Funding rates have been fluctuating at and below neutral for the better part of the month but the latter looks to have finally won out. After bitcoin had dropped below $20,000 last week, expectations had been that more traders would want to get in given the low prices. However, it has gone the other way as average funding rates are now in the negative.

Both Binance and ByBit have recorded average funding rates of -0.0015 for last week. A significant drop from the neutral 0.01% average aggregated funding rates. What this shows is that the bearish sentiment among the perp traders has been growing. As such, they have been leaning towards short traders.

Funding rates turn negative | Source: Arcane Research

It comes hot on the heels of open interest reaching a new high. Most of which have come from both Binance and ByBit. These two metrics expressly show that short traders are more active compared to their long counterparts.

Crypto Sentiment Still Bad

Crypto perp traders are not the only ones that are currently bearish on the market. The same is the case across the space where investors have chosen to hold their cards closer to their chest than they normally would. The Fear & Greed Index puts the crypto market sentiment in the extreme fear territory for another day yet again. Meaning that the market has now closed out two consecutive months with the extreme fear sentiment.

Total market cap falls below $900 billion | Source: Crypto Total Market Cap on TradingView.com

This is apparent in the exchange inflows and outflows, both of which have declined in the last couple of days. However, the ratio of inflows to outflows shows that investors are refusing to take any risk in the market. Bitcoin’s net flows came out to -$29.7 million after outflows had touched $901.6 million for the past day, according to Glassnode.

Related Reading | Bitcoin Records Worst Performance For June, Will It Get Better From Here?

Tether inflows have remained muted as investors are sentiment less money into exchanges to purchase tokens. With positive net flow only coming out to $14.2 million for the past day. Sell-offs have also continued, threatening to drag the market even lower.

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Bitcoin Decline Sees Funding Rates Plunge To Three-Month Lows

Bitcoin funding rates have taken a nosedive after massive sell-offs at the beginning of the week. Bitcoin had made a remarkable recovery coming out of a slow weekend but these sell-offs would quickly wipe off all of the gains made, and with it, the funding rates came crashing down. It led to one of the most brutal crashes in funding rates in recent history. This has seen it touch one of its lowest points since February.

Factors Behind Decline

The bitcoin funding rates had plummeted due to the sell-offs that were recorded on Monday night. Most notably had been the plunge in crypto exchange Bybit which had declined to its three-month low of -0.0378%. It represented one of the largest declines of all cryptocurrency exchanges, of which Binance’s levels had stopped at 0.01378%. This sent funding rates to February 2nd levels, although stopping at a higher low compared to the carnage witnessed on May 12th.

Related Reading | Bitcoin Miner Revenues Stay Low As Price Decline Continues

These negative funding rates persisted throughout the week before culminating in the June decline. Bybit and Binance have both seen negative rates due to the lagging on the perpetual spot markets. It shows a high correlation to the price of the digital asset which had fallen back below $31,000 on Monday night to land at $29,000.

BTC funding rates see sharp decline | Source: Arcane Research

Funding rates on the Binance exchange have now been at the neutral to negative levels for half a year now. This is a new record for the exchange after enjoying some of the best months in the year 2021. The funding rates overall have been in the neutral to below neutral levels for the better part of 2022 and this does not seem to be changing anytime soon.

Bitcoin Trend After Decline

The decline in the funding rates coincided with the decline in the price of the digital asset. Bitcoin which had been making steady gains had lost all of it on Monday and returned to the $29,000. However, this would not hold for long as the digital asset would start a reversal that would put it back above $30,000 by the end of Wednesday.

BTC settles above $30,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

This recovery is also credited to the fact that investors are returning back to BTC to seek safe haven. Altcoins had been the winners of the 2021 bull rallies but with the 2022 bear market had come massive losses and as such, investors had moved on to strong digital assets such as bitcoin. 

Related Reading | U.S. Macro Pressure Responsible For Entire Bitcoin Downtrend

With this, bitcoin is now trading above its 20-day moving average but continues to lie below its 50-day moving average. This indicates that bears still largely maintain their hold on the market but a turn in the tide may be coming if there is significant buy pressure in the market. 

Bitcoin is trading at $30,475 at the time of this writing. It is maintaining its recovery trend in the early hours of Thursday. However, with the opening of the U.S. trading hours, more sell-offs are expected, leading to a decline in price.

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Perp Traders Remain Quiet As Bitcoin Struggles To Hold $30,000

Bitcoin has been struggling to hold on to the $30,000 level for the better part of this week, failing more often than not. While there have been various reactions from different parts of the market such as the ETFs, perpetual traders seem to have taken this as a sign to hold off on their activities. What this has led to is a continuation of the neutral or below-neutral funding rates that have been recorded in the past couple of weeks.

Bitcoin Funding Rates Unmoved

For the past few months, bitcoin funding rates have been tethering around the neutral and below neutral levels. This has been the case through both market recoveries and downtrends, although there have been periods of slight deviations where funding rates have recovered into the positive but even these have been short-lived.

Related Reading | Institutional Investors Seek Safe Haven In Crypto Products Amid Market Uncertainty

The last time that the funding rate saw a sharp recovery had been May 12th on the Binance exchange, after which funding rates had once more returned to trending at the neutral and below neutral line. This is interesting given that open interest in perpetual had surged to new all-time highs during this time. 

Funding rates fall below neutral | Source: Arcane Research

The 21 bitcoin funding rate intervals on the Binance and Bybit exchanges have been dominated by below-neutral funding rates. A total of 16 funding rates have been neural while 5 have been neutral funding rates. All this while, the perps have continued to trade at a reasonable discount to the spot.

Leverage Still Surging

Even though bitcoin funding rates have been straggling, it has not affected the performance of open interest (OI). OI had declined significantly in the previous week but last week saw BTC denominated open interest retrace its steps and add 41,000 BTC. This brought the total denominated OI to touch new all-time highs of 290,000BTC, beating the previous May 4th high of 282,000 BTC. Just a week after open interest had dived more than 35,000 BTC.

Mostly, the surge in open interest has followed the times when the funding rates have been below neutral. At times where funding rates have been neutral or above neutral, open interest has usually been down.

BTC fails to hold above $30,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

What this suggests is that there will likely be more volatility coming into the market. This could happen regardless of whether the price recovers or continues to decline. However, the growth in open interest usually precedes a large recovery trend such as the one recorded during the July 26th short squeeze. So more than likely, it will be a recovery in price that will follow this surge in volatility. 

Related Reading | Bitcoin On-Chain Activity Throttled After LUNA Collapse

Bitcoin remains the largest cryptocurrency in the space with a market cap of $552 billion. It is up 5.10% in the last 24 hours to be trading at $29,200 at the time of this writing.

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Funding Rates Fall To Yearly Lows Following Bitcoin’s Fall Below $29,000

Bitcoin has had a rough couple of weeks leading up to this moment and the effects of this are still being felt all across the board. This has seen bitcoin’s price crumble below $30,000 once more. Along with this fall has come some other brutal news for the digital asset. One of these has been the funding rates, whose massive dive has shown increasingly bearish momentum among the largest traders.

Funding Rates Take A Dive

The Bitcoin funding rates had been in a bit of a lull even as the price of BTC had begun taking its beat-down at the $40,000 level. Mostly, it had remained neutral or below neutral so the sudden drop in funding rates is no surprise. However, the degree to which it had dropped had been more cause for concern. This time around, funding rates have taken a nosedive that has sent them towards yearly lows.

Related Reading | How The Tether Peg Could Predict Raging Bitcoin Volatility

Arcane Research reports that the plunge had come in the midst of the sell-offs that had rocked the market last week. This had seen funding rates drop across major exchanges in the space. Most notably on May 12th when the funding rate had fallen to a -0.0042% on the biggest exchange, Binance. 

Funding rates decline to yearly lows | Source: Arcane Research

An interesting note is that funding rates, despite trending in the negative territory, have not been this low since July of 2021. This means that this is the most significant dip that has been recorded in the market in the space of a year. 

Traders were already bearish before now, resulting in the neutral funding rates that were recorded the previous week. However, this proves that the larger market is expecting more bearish trends and are therefore making moves to protect themselves.

Bitcoin Long Liquidations Is The Trigger

After the decline below $30,000, bitcoin had recorded one of the most brutal liquidation trends in recent memory. Liquidations had reached as high as $0.73 billion in bitcoin liquidated in a single day, culminating in the highest liquidation event recorded since the December 4th crash. 

BTC price declines below $29,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

Future and perp traders had obviously borne the brunt of this and this, in turn, had negatively affected the funding rates. The perpetual markets trading substantially below the spot market following the liquidations had contributed greatly to the plummet in funding rates.

Related Reading | Crypto Carnage Causes Flight To Bitcoin Safe Haven, Dominance Demonstrates

The funding rates had begun to recover after May 12th though. Briefly returning to the neutral territory before once more plummeting back down. However, the fall rate has not been as deep as the previous fall. 

Funding rates still remain well below neutral at the time of the report, which means that perp traders are still very bearish on the market, and as such, are not putting as much money into the digital asset.

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Bitcoin Funding Rates Remain Unmoved Despite Plunge To $30,000

Bitcoin funding rates had taken a plunge at the beginning of May. While this had not been a pronounced bear trend at that point, the price of BTC was already showing some signs of weakness. That weakness has now seen the digital asset plunge below $30,000 for the first time in 2022 and back up. However, funding rates that had returned to neutral had remained unmoved by this volatility in the market.

Bitcoin Funding Rates Are Unshaken

Bitcoin had seen some massive sell-offs around the $35,000 level. This was mainly triggered by investors panicking that they may lose more of their holdings and as such, had tried exiting the cryptocurrency to mitigate these losses. The resultant fear and liquidations that had erupted had worked together to push the price of the digital asset even further down, and like clockwork, every other thing in the market had followed this downtrend.

Related Reading | Market Downtrend Trigger Bitcoin Inflows From Institutional Investors

Funding rates would prove to be one of the few immune to this downtrend. After recovering from its crash at the start of the month, it had gone back to the neutral level and this is where it stayed even as bitcoin had broken down below $35,000. Even when its price had fallen lower, funding rates had remained unshaken.

Funding rates remain neutral | Source: Arcane Research

This follows the same trend that had been recorded since the December 4th crash. Funding rates had started on a trend of being at or below neutral and have not deviated from this since then. It was obviously the result of negative sentiment across investors which had led to low momentum.

Another group that this is indicative of is the perp traders. These perpetual traders have been following the spot market closely. This is obviously a deviation from the norm because as seen in previous market trends, the funding rates fall when the price of the digital asset falls.

BTC crumbles to $29,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

This indicates that these perp traders are leaning towards adding more long exposure with the digital asset. Mostly, this is happening near what is perceived to be the bottom of the one-and-a-half-year trading range. 

Related Reading | Shiba Inu Vs. Dogecoin And LUNA: Which One Will Survive The Crypto Carnage?

The average funding rate is pulled from cryptocurrency exchanges Binance and Bybit, both of which have proven to have the most presence from perp traders. Even though the whole Terra UST issues, funding rates have refused to budge.

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