This Friday, December 26, a massive event is happening in the cryptocurrency world. Around 263,000 Bitcoin options contracts are set to expire. These contracts are worth roughly $23 billion. This is a big deal because it’s happening at the end of the quarter and the year. It might affect how Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies trade in the market, which has been mostly quiet this week.
During the Christmas holidays, trading activity has been slow. Many investors are looking forward to 2026, hoping the usual four-year trend of Bitcoin’s price swings has changed.
What Are Bitcoin Options?
Bitcoin options contracts are special kinds of deals. They give people the right (but not the obligation) to buy or sell Bitcoin at a set price on a specific date. It’s a popular way for investors to try and make money from Bitcoin without directly holding it. You can learn more about Bitcoin and its history here.
Details About the BTC Options
This week, these Bitcoin options have something called a “put/call ratio” of 0.37. This means there are a lot more people betting that Bitcoin’s price will rise (called “calls”) than those betting it will fall (called “puts”). To understand this ratio better, the put/call ratio measures how many put options are traded versus call options.
Something else to note is the “max pain” price, which is around $96,000, according to Coinglass. In simple terms, the max pain price is the price at which the most contracts will lose money when they expire. You can think of it as the price level where the most investors will feel disappointed.
The contracts are also based on a striking price, or a key point that influences their value. On the platform called Deribit, the highest amount of Bitcoin options contracts (worth $2.2 billion) is set at a strike price of $100,000. There is another $2.2 billion tied to a strike price of $85,000. Altogether, the total value of Bitcoin options across all trading platforms is $52 billion. This big number is referred to as the “open interest” in options trades, which shows how many contracts are still waiting to be settled. More information about open interest can be found here.
Why Does This Matter?
People are curious about what will happen once these contracts expire. Crypto exchange platform Deribit asked: “How will the market react to such a large expiry?” Sometimes after contracts expire, traders adjust their positions. This can influence the prices of Bitcoin and other cryptos in the market.
“Post-expiry flows will matter more than price. Watch positioning. How would the market react to an expiry this big?” — Deribit
Derbit highlighted that during big expiry events like this, big institutions often make early moves to avoid risks. After the expiry, smaller players or individuals might find leftover opportunities with favorable pricing.
What About Ethereum?
Bitcoin isn’t the only crypto seeing major expiries this week. Around 1.25 million Ethereum options contracts will also expire. These contracts are worth about $3.4 billion. The max pain price for Ethereum is $3,100, and the put/call ratio is 0.45. This ratio shows a bit more balance but still indicates slightly more people expect the price to rise.
Altogether, the value of all Ethereum options contracts across platforms adds up to $11 billion. However, this number has been dropping since late August. According to Deribit, Ethereum options traders are cautious but haven’t given up yet. Ethereum uses a technology called smart contracts, which power many decentralized applications.
Combining the Bitcoin and Ethereum expiring options, today’s total crypto expiration value is about $27 billion.
The Spot Market Snapshot
The “spot market” is where cryptocurrencies are traded for immediate delivery, instead of futures or options that manage trade for the future. In case you want to learn more about it, you can read about spot markets here.
The total crypto market value has stayed stable above $3 trillion this week. Bitcoin’s price made a small jump to $89,000 but couldn’t maintain that level for long. At the time of writing, it’s back down to $88,850. Overall, Bitcoin prices haven’t moved much this week.
Ethereum’s price is still struggling below $3,000. Most other cryptocurrencies (called altcoins) are also not performing well and remain in the red.
This huge expiry is capturing the attention of investors everywhere. How the market reacts after the expiration will be an interesting outcome to watch.