Bitcoin traded flat near $64,000 while global equities pushed to fresh records. On-chain data shows the asset in its longest capitulation phase since the FTX collapse in late 2022.
BTC sat at about $64,292, up 0.16% since midnight UTC on Aug. 5, per CoinDesk. Ether stands alone among major assets, down on the week, CoinDesk reported separately. The S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average both closed at all-time highs Tuesday. MSCI’s All Country World Index added 0.4% toward another record close. The MSCI Asia Pacific benchmark gained 2.2%.
This divergence has more to do with positioning than price. Glassnode’s aggregate price-cycle basket, a composite of several on-chain metrics, puts bitcoin in its coldest capitulation phase since November 2022. That marks the longest sustained reading of its kind since the FTX blow-up. Two independent data points, the Glassnode reading and derivatives flow, both point the same direction.
Derivatives paint a muted picture for the majors. Bitcoin and ether futures drew little action. The long/short ratio tilted bearish, with shorts holding 51% of taker volume, per CoinDesk. Bitcoin’s 30-day implied volatility sat around 36%. Ether’s matched. Deribit options volume still features call options, but OTC desk Paradigm showed bearish ether risk reversals. That is not a market reaching for upside.
Altcoins drew the aggressive flows. PUMP topped the top-100 tokens over 24 hours, up 115%, with open interest climbing 9% to 84.76 billion tokens. XLM, ZEC and BNB also logged OI gains. XLM’s funding rate dropped to a notably negative -23% annualized, meaning perpetuals traded at a discount to spot. ZEC and BTC hold positive 24h OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta, the highest among majors, suggesting aggressive longs via market orders. XLM and DOGE sit on the opposite side.
The macro backdrop explains part of the drift. Optimism over AI and progress toward a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz pushed oil prices lower. Brent crude fell, CoinDesk noted. Risk assets rallied broadly on easing geopolitical tension. Crypto did not.
Capital has been rotating out for months. U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs recorded $5.4 billion in net outflows in the first half of the year as money moved into AI-linked assets. Tether’s (USDT) market cap shrank by $4 billion over 60 days. That ranks as one of the steepest contractions on record, per CryptoQuant, cited by CoinDesk. CryptoQuant notes the deepest USDT contraction phases historically line up closer to selling-pressure exhaustion than the start of another leg down. Past troughs this deep, in early 2023 and mid-2026, preceded BTC recoveries. Supply has not yet turned back up.
“Institutional and retail interest in crypto as an investment has cooled as AI absorbs a disproportionate share of capital and attention,” DWF Labs wrote in a report. “Most sectors, not just crypto, have underperformed AI over the past year.”
On the corporate side, Circle Internet (CRCL) posted Q2 revenue of $701 million. That was up 7% year-over-year but short of estimates, per Bloomberg. Galaxy Digital (GLXY) is due to report today. Riot Platforms (RIOT) delayed its release.
U.S. employment figures and the ISM services PMI land later today and may set the next leg. For now, the signals converge. Record stocks. Flat bitcoin. Cold on-chain readings. Traders, as ever, disagree on what comes next.
