The largest cluster of ether call options for June's expiry date is concentrated at a strike price of $4,000, according to Deribit data.
Deribit Chief Commercial Officer Luuk Strijers shared charts with The Block that showed a notable grouping of ether call options at this strike price.
“As you can be see from Deribit data, the $4,000 strike is the largest of both June and September expiries. We don’t have the May expiry tradable yet so can only look at June versus April for ether," Strijers said.
Deribit data shows ether call options concentrated at $4,000 for the end of June expiry date. Image: The Block.
The concentration at the $4,000 strike price suggests that market participants have a particular interest or expectation that the price of ether will rise above $4,000 by the expiration dates of the options. This concentration may reflect a consensus or speculation about the potential future movement of ether's price in the market.
Deribit data shows ether call options concentrated at $4,000 for the end of September expiry date. Image: The Block.
Traders anticipating spot ether ETF approval
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According to an analyst, it is notable that the concentration of ether call options at a strike price of $4,000 comes after the potential approval of a spot Ethereum ETF by the end of May. The final approval decision deadline for spot ether ETF applications submitted by asset managers VanEck and Ark/21Shares to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is May 23.
"Traders seem to be adjusting their ether options contracts with the May 23 date in mind," Bitfinex Head of Derivatives Jag Kooner told The Block.
However, Strijers said that it is too early to draw a conclusion regarding whether derivatives traders are anticipating a price appreciation following a potential approval of a spot Ether ETF. "June skew is higher than April indicating calls to be relatively more expensive however it’s difficult to link specifically to ether ETF news or expected correlation to BTC halving," he added.
Options are derivative contracts that give a trader the right but not the obligation to buy or sell the underlying asset at a predetermined price on or before a specific date. A call option gives the right to buy, and a put offers the right to sell. It is assumed that a trader who buys put options is implicitly bearish on the market, while a call buyer is bullish.
Ether's price increased by over 2% on Friday, changing hands for $2,470 at 5:30 a.m. ET, according to The Block's Price Page.
The price of ether has increased by over 2% in the past 24 hours. Image: The Block.
Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.
© 2023 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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Ethereum ETH
-1.84%
transaction volume has increased since the beginning of February, with network gas fees hitting a multi-month high.
According to The Block's Data Dashboard, the seven-day moving average for the economic throughput on the Ethereum blockchain has reached a high of over $3.55 billion. This is an increase of over 15% from a seven-day moving average of $3.08 billion at the beginning of the month.

The uptick in transaction volume over the past weeks has caused a spike in Ethereum network gas fees. The seven-day moving average of this metric has increased to a multi-month high of over $11. This is an elevated level not seen since mid-December 2023, according to The Block's Data Dashboard.

Gas fees spiked significantly on Feb. 9, according to YCharts data. On Friday, total Ethereum network gas fees amounted to 854 ether.
A total of 854 ETH was taken in gas fees on Friday, February 9. Image: YCharts.
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The recent surge in gas prices may be attributed to a combination of factors.
In the past week, the volume of NFTs traded on Ethereum reached its highest level since late February last year, according to data from The Block.
According to The Block's Data Dashboard, Ethereum NFT trading volume is currently at its highest weekly level since the week of Feb. 26, 2023. In the past week, Ethereum NFT trading volume reached a multi-month high of $147.29 million.

The price of ether decreased 1.9% to $2,476 at 5:30 a.m. ET, according to The Block's Price Page.
The price of ether slipped almost 2% in the past 24 hours. Image: The Block.
Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.
© 2023 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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San Francisco-based economic data field company, Truflation, has secured $6 million in funding from a group of investors including Laser Digital, Red Beard Ventures, and Abra. The company plans to use the funds to expand its operations and development efforts. Truflation offers a comprehensive selection of independent indexes and data feeds compiled using millions of data points aggregated in real-time, providing an accurate alternative to data collection methods employed by official data agencies. The company also offers a DRPp protocol that tracks real-time data across networks, markets, and feeds, providing the necessary data infrastructure to bring about systemic advancements in the economy.
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According to the on-chain data tracking service WhaleAlert, at around 19:09 on February 8th Beijing time, 4,069 BTC (worth about $182,263,039) was transferred from an unknown wallet to Coinbase Institutional.
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told Sen. Sherrod Brown that the Treasury Department could use more authority to combat the alleged use of crypto by terrorist groups during a congressional hearing.
The Ohio Democrat, who is viewed as holding the purse strings for any future crypto legislation, asked Yellen about what updates the Treasury needs to address the matter during Thursday's Senate Banking Committee hearing. Though most of the hearing centered around discussions of the economy as a whole, some Democrats asked Yellen about the use of crypto by bad actors.
"We know that terrorist groups like Hamas, Al-Qaeda and Hezbollah have used digital assets to raise and transfer funds. We have important tools to counter illicit finance, but most of them date back to the post-9/11 era," Brown said." As terrorists continue to innovate, do we need to update our counter terrorism tools, Madam Secretary, to respond to the risks created by digital assets?"
Yellen said Treasury could use additional authority.
"We do have many authorities that enable us to act, but we've identified a number of holes in our authorities and have composed a list of suggestions for ways in which Treasury's authorities could and should be strengthened," Yellen said.
Brown, who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, has called for a crackdown on the use of crypto to fund terrorism before and is in talks about a bill that would target the use of digital assets for money laundering, according to Politico.
Push for a bill to prevent terrorism financing
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Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., asked Yellen during Thursday's hearing whether she thought his recent legislation, which would crack down on the ability of terrorist groups to use crypto, was needed.
Sens. Warner, D-Va., Mike Rounds, R-S.D, Jack Reed, D-R.I, and Mitt Romney, R-Utah, introduced the Terrorism Financing Prevention Act in December which expands the Treasury Department's authority beyond a 2015 law that focused primarily on Hezbollah.
The new bill would allow the agency to identify foreign financial institutions and foreign digital asset companies that knowingly facilitate transactions for Hamas and other groups, and then sanction them.
"I would agree that there are limitations that Treasury faces and we certainly support the aims of the bill," Yellen said. "It would help give us authorities that would enable us to better deal with a very significant threat."
"I'm going to count that as an endorsement," Warner said in response.
Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.
© 2023 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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The decentralized derivative protocol MYX announced the official launch of its mainnet. With the launch of the mainnet, MYX will introduce a gem system, and trading users will receive gems according to the rules, which will become important credentials for future airdrop plans. Previously, MYX had successfully completed a $5 million seed round of financing, led by Hongshan.
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On February 8th, the ApeCoin community voted to approve the proposal to continue with "Choosing a Builder to Establish a Dedicated ApeChain Blockchain", with a final approval rate of 95.47%. The purpose of this proposal is to select a builder to construct ApeChain (a dedicated ApeCoin blockchain) in order to expand APE and support the development of the ApeCoin ecosystem.
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According to official sources, Aperture Finance has now launched the token terminal platform, where users can view project-related on-chain data through the token terminal website.Aperture Finance aims to build an intent-based infrastructure and a decentralized solver network. Its intent-based flagship products include ApertureSwap, liquidity management tools, and various innovative solvers for temporal and subscription-based intents.
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On February 17th, Celsius announced that its qualified creditors have claimed over $2 billion worth of Bitcoin and Ethereum through channels such as PayPal, Venmo, and Coinbase. The official statement mentioned that the team is exploring solutions to restrict mailing USD checks and will allow some creditors to choose to receive fund allocations through wire transfer.
Previously, Celsius announced on Twitter that the USD-denominated Celsius claim distribution will issue and mail checks to some Celsius creditors.
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The FTX Debtors estate, led by CEO John Ray III, has filed to sell another one of its assets: Digital Custody Inc. (DCI). FTX had purchased the subsidiary in two $5 million transactions in Dec. 2021 and Aug. 2022; however, the company will be sold to CoinList for just $500,000, with the financing provided by DCI's original CEO and seller, Terence J. Culver.
In their filing, FTX's lawyers explain that DCI was purchased to provide custodial services for FTX.US and LedgerX, though the company was never formally integrated into the FTX ecosystem before former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried filed for bankruptcy in November 2022, three months after the DCI purchase was finalized.
The lawyers also explain that their failure to restart FTX.US means DCI is essentially worthless to the estate, writing "DCI is also no longer useful to the Debtors’ business given the Debtors’ sale of LedgerX and that it is unlikely for the Debtors to sell or restart FTX US."
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However, DCI retains a license from the South Dakota Division of Banking that allows it to provide custodial services. After receiving offers from three interested parties, including Culver, the Debtors chose the purchaser "...based on its superior offer, ability to execute the Sale Transaction within a short time frame and relationship with Mr. Culver, which the Debtors believe will be advantageous in aiding Purchaser in obtaining regulatory approval for the Sale Transaction in an expeditious manner."
FTX's lawyers note that the Committee and the Ad Hoc Committee of Non-US Customers of FTX.com both approved the transaction, though as part of the deal, FTX has until three days before the closing to find a better offer for DCI. A reverse-termination fee of $50,000 will apply if the purchaser is unable to close the deal.
Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet that delivers news, research, and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor of The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the crypto space. Crypto exchange Bitget is an anchor LP for Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to deliver objective, impactful, and timely information about the crypto industry. Here are our current financial disclosures.
© 2023 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
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According to WhalePanda data, the net inflow of the US Bitcoin spot ETF was $477 million on February 15.
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Binance has announced its support for the BNB Beacon Chain (BEP2) network fusion plan to provide users with a high-quality experience during the network fusion process.The Binance team works closely with all the listed project teams that have deployed tokens on the BNB Beacon Chain (BEP2) network to ensure that they can assist token holders in smoothly migrating assets. Before the BNB Beacon Chain (BEP2) network is closed, Binance recommends that users recharge their Binance Hooked Tokens (B-tokens) on the BEP2 network to their Binance accounts. These tokens will be credited to the user's account and can be withdrawn through their native chain or other chains supported by Binance.From now on, the withdrawal of Binance Hooked Tokens (B-tokens) on the above network will be suspended; before 07:59 on February 22 (GMT+8), the withdrawal of other tokens on the above network will continue to be supported. After 07:59 on February 22 (GMT+8), users will no longer be able to withdraw tokens on the above network. Users can withdraw through other supported networks where applicable; Binance will continue to support the recharge of Binance Hooked Tokens (B-tokens) and selected token businesses on the above network until further notice.
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JediSwap, the AMM protocol in the Starknet ecosystem, has released Jediswap v2.The new features include:Concentrated liquidity (strategically providing liquidity within a certain price range to maximize capital efficiency);Customizable fee tier pool (users can add liquidity to different currency pools for the same currency pair and charge different exchange fees);Price efficiency (optimizing user overnight interest by identifying the most efficient path through innovative routers);Similar to Uniswap v3 design (teams building tools for concentrated liquidity positions in the EVM ecosystem can quickly use the tools on Starknet);Establishing a point system and ranking system for liquidity providers and traders, and ranking them based on the value they bring to Jediswap as users.
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According to official sources, L2 network Linea has announced the official launch of Alpha v2 upgrade, with the aim of reducing the cost of publishing data and zero-knowledge proof verification on the Ethereum chain by about 90%. It is reported that Alpha V2 has now completed the deployment of Linea's mainnet and introduced two new features, proof aggregation and data compression. Now, each Linea transaction will be summarized into one batch and published to the first layer (L1). Through proof aggregation, Linea can recursively prove many consecutive batches of transactions as one final proof, thereby making the verification cost of N batches cheaper by N times; data compression can effectively encode duplicate bytes, which meets the requirement of maintaining low computational cost.
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