Ether call options concentrate on $2,550 for Friday's expiry on Deribit

Ether active options data shows the largest cluster of contracts outstanding are calls with a strike price of $2,550, set to expire on Friday, Jan. 19. According to Deribit data, there are over 24,600 contracts outstanding for calls at the strike price of $2,550, with a notional value of over $62 million.

In options trading, a call option gives the holder the right, but not the obligation, to buy the underlying asset at a specified price before or on the expiration date.

Ether call options are concentrated at $2,550 ahead of Friday's expiry. Image: Deribit.

The presence of a significant number of call options at $2,550 indicates that a substantial portion of traders anticipated an increase in the price of ether above $2,550 by the mid-January expiration date. However, the price of ether has fallen by almost 1% in the past 24 hours to trade at $2,516, according to The Block's Prices Page.

The ether price has fallen almost 1% in the past 24 hours. Image: The Block.

Ethereum spot ETF anticipations

Ether's price has declined in the past 24 hours, but the asset has still outperformed bitcoin in the week after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approved multiple spot bitcoin ETFs. Bitcoin's value has fallen by around 10% in the past week, whereas ether's price has declined by just over 5%. According to Wednesday's Market Update from QCP Capital the ETH -1.29% /BTC exchange rate has risen from 0.05 to 0.06 over the same time frame. QCP Capital analysts also expect ether to continue outperforming bitcoin over the medium term as the market narrative rotates to the potential approval of spot ether ETFs.

CoinShares Ethereum Research Associate Luke Nolan sets the probability of spot ether ETFs being approved in 2024 at 70%. “However, it is possible that the market is getting excited a little bit too quickly, our view is that Q4 2024 would be the earliest time for approval, and it is, in our view, unlikely to materialize before then,” he told The Block.

YouHodler Chief of Markets Ruslan Lienkha perceives obstacles that could hinder the possible approval of spot ether ETFs this year. “The SEC will try to find some arguments to reject filings. In this case, Ethereum is much more centralized than bitcoin, therefore it has more similarities with securities, and the SEC knows about it. However, I think ETH will continue to correlate with BTC in the long run and may temporarily outperform due to all the speculative sentiment about possible ETF approvals,” Lienkha told The Block.