Crypto Markets Today: Bitcoin, ether extend pullback amid thin liquidity, macro jitters

The crypto market failed to recover from Monday's sell-off, with bitcoin BTC$87,585.89 trading 4% lower at $86,100 and ether dropping back below $3,000 after slumping 6.7% in 24 hours.

The slide sent the CoinDesk 20 Index down 4.3%, with all members of the index lower, alongside a move to the downside in traditional markets. The Nasdaq Composite fell for a second straight day on Monday, losing 2.6% in the period, on concerns over the potential of an AI bubble and weak employment data. The U.S. is due to report labor market statistics including November's nonfarm payrolls number later Tuesday.

"Consensus forecasts suggest around 50,000 new hires were made, less than half the 119,000 seen in September, but the range of expectations is much wider than usual," Derren Nathan, head of equity research at Hargreaves Lansdown, said in an email.

"If recent private jobs data is anything to go by, the risk here is to the downside."

The crypto market has significantly underperformed equities since the October wipeout, in part due to a lack of liquidity that means general price movements continue to be exaggerated.

Derivatives positioning

• Volmex's one-day BVIV, which measures an annualized expected price turbulence over 24 hours, remains locked in recent ranges above 50%. This implies a 24-hour move of 2.6%, which is nothing out of ordinary even as key economic data are due for release.
• Exchanges liquidated over $660 million in leveraged futures bets in 24 hours. Most of these were longs, clearing bullish leverage from the market.
• The cumulative global open interest (OI) in BTC futures crossed above 700K BTC, the highest since Nov. 21. An uptick in OI alongside a drop in spot price is said to represent an influx of bearish short positions and confirm downtrend.
• XRP's futures OI rose to 1.96B XRP, the highest since Oct. 11.
• The OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta for most major tokens fell, indicating aggressive net selling pressure.
• On Deribit, BTC and ETH put options continue to trade pricier than calls, indicating persistent downside concerns. The persistent put premium also stems from institutional interest in call overwriting strategies.
• The $85K bitcoin put has emerged as the second-most popular option behind the $100K call.
• Block flows featured BTC put diagonal spreads, put ration spreads and straddles. In ETH's case, traders preferred put butterflies.

Token talk

• The altcoin market continues to yearn for a bullish catalyst following a two-month period of corrective price action.
• ASTER, ONDO and STRK all lost more than 10% in the past 24 hours, underperforming the wider market.
• One glimmer of hope for the altcoin market is that several tokens are now in "oversold" territory, according the average crypto relative strength index (RSI) indicator.
• This suggests that the market may be ready for a slight bounce before the U.S. employment figures are released.
• A number of tokens including XRP, SOL and ADA are also approaching key levels of support that provided a series of local bottoms over the past year, so while altcoin sentiment is low, this could be an area that sparks investor appetite.