Over $2.8 billion bet on bitcoin topping $90,000 because it hits all-time high

Bitcoin reached a fresh all-time high near $81,000 and futures premiums soared, in a transparent sign that investors imagine the record-run on the earth’s largest cryptocurrency is poised for much more gains on the back of U.S. elections that saw a swell of pro-crypto candidates win office.

Open interest in bitcoin’s price surpassing $90,000 rose to greater than $2.8 billion on the favored Deribit derivatives exchange, considered one of just a few crypto native platforms that provides futures trading. Deribit encompasses a lot of the offshore options market.

“The choices market’s bias is heavily toward continued momentum. Call options trade at a premium to puts, and open interest in out-of-the-money calls has grown,” Vetle Lunde, head of research at K33 Research, told CNBC.

A call option gives the customer the appropriate to purchase shares of an underlying asset at a certain price for a specified time period. Buying a call option is a bet the asset price will move higher. Buying a put option is a bet the asset price will fall.

The CME derivates exchange offers bitcoin futures contracts and is a well-liked way for institutions within the U.S. to make bets on the longer term price of bitcoin. Velde told CNBC that on Friday CME premiums for ether and bitcoin averaged 14.5% and 14%, respectively. Ahead of the election, Velde says these premiums sat at 7%, and had spent a majority of the past half yr hovering barely below 10%.

“The recent surge is a meaningful deviation higher emphasizing the bullish flows of late,” he added, noting that yields roughly stabilized well into the double digits after the election became clear.

“Alongside the expansion in leverage, we saw the primary meaningful example of growing yields in offshore derivatives, indicative of the move being led by determined risk-takers positioning for further upside,” said Velde.

The early innings of bitcoin’s push higher coincided with substantial growth in open interest in perpetual swaps, or contracts that allow buyers to invest on where they think prices are headed and not using a set expiration date.

But liquidity in crypto markets on weekends is usually poorer than during weekdays, as neither CME futures nor ETFs are open to trade, so moves thus are inclined to overreact and substantially retrace once these markets open again, based on Velde.

President-elect Donald Trump promised on the campaign trail to show the US into the “crypto capital of the planet.” His multiple pledges to the crypto community included launching a national crypto stockpile with the greater than $16 billion in bitcoin the U.S. government has amassed through asset seizures, in addition to slashing rates of interest. The easing of monetary policy typically dovetails with a surge in crypto prices because it makes it cheaper to borrow money.

The Federal Reserve, which guides the country’s monetary policy, sets the benchmark rate. It also, by design, operates independently from the White House. On Thursday, the Fed approved its second consecutive rate of interest cut.

On the back of election results and the Fed’s unanimous vote to again slash the benchmark rate, the crypto market broadly surged into the weekend. Ether eclipsed bitcoin’s rise, up 30% within the last seven days, and solana’s market cap topped $100 billion on Sunday.

The entire market cap of all spot bitcoin ETFs is now above $80 billion, and within the last three trading days alone, the spot funds collectively added $2.3 billion.

Inside fintech, firms tied to crypto were among the top performers, after candidates funded by the crypto industry won races up and down the ballot.

Coinbase shares jumped 48% for the week, their strongest performance since January 2023. Coinbase was considered one of the highest corporate donors within the election cycle, giving greater than $75 million to Fairshake and its affiliate PACs, including a fresh pledge of $25 million to support the pro-crypto super PAC within the 2026 midterms.

Trump has vowed to oust SEC Chair Gary Gensler, which potentially bodes well for firms like Coinbase fighting the regulator in court over alleged securities offenses.

“Tuesday night was actually an enormous night for crypto and the crypto voter,” Coinbase’s chief legal officer Paul Grewal said in an interview. “We’ll have essentially the most pro-crypto Congress ever, and Coinbase has played some part in all of that.”

Robinhood, which allows users to purchase and sell plenty of digital currencies, rose 27% for the week. The web brokerage received a Wells Notice from the SEC in May, a move that usually precedes formal charges.

Robinhood’s general manager for its crypto unit told CNBC that the goal at Robinhood is to give you the option to work inside the administration.

“When you take into consideration crypto, it’s a really fast-moving pace. It’s complicated, it was made by engineers, for engineers,” said Johann Kerbrat, the Vice President and General Manager of Robinhood Crypto. “We would like to assist policymakers to grasp it and help them drive the appropriate protections for the shoppers.”