Layer-2 and DeFi tokens lead broad crypto advance as post-Fed hike nerves fade

Crypto’s post-Fed hike bid extended into Friday, with decentralized finance (DeFi) and layer-2 tokens taking over from privacy and haven assets that led Thursday’s gains, a rotation that demonstrates a return to risk-on trading.

Bitcoin

$BTC$78,192.86

rose above $78,000 during the European morning, adding 2.1% since midnght UTC and 1.9% over the past 24 hours. It’s still 5% below the Sept. 4 monthly high of $82,284 after two weeks of range-bound price action.

While all but two CoinDesk 100 constituents were higher on the day, the focus is on the DeFi Select Index (DFX). That accelerated the fastest, surging by 8.3% since midnight and 16% over the past 24 hours.

Market gains follow a more conducive macro backdrop. The 10-year Treasury yield slipped back under 5% and Brent crude eased below $103 after trading as high as $109 earlier in the week, taking some of the heat out of the inflation scare that followed the rate increase.

Equity index futures also showed strength, with S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures rising 0.3% and 0.6%, respectively, while gold and silver added 1.1% and 2.8% apiece.

Derivative positioning

• Futures market signals positional trading revival: The crypto futures market is signaling a revival in positional trading. This shift is underscored by a nearly 5% expansion in cumulative open interest (OI) to $141.2 billion, which contrasts with a 3% dip in daily trading volume to $95 billion. The taker buy-sell volume remains balanced, suggesting capital is entering the market structurally rather than through aggressive momentum chasing.
• Bitcoin open interest builds as the price gains: OI in bitcoin futures ticked up to 680K $BTC from 670K $BTC since midnight UTC, a slight increase alongside $BTC‘s advance. This combination is typically taken to represent a build-up of long, or bullish, positions. However, the increase is quite small, and the OI tally remains well below the peak of 800K $BTC hit early this year. In other words, overall positioning remains light.
• Binance trader ratios show institutional conviction: Binance’s top trader long-short accounts ratio has pulled back to 1.52, still bullish, but lower than Wednesday’s high of nearly 2. Meanwhile, the long-short positions ratio remains elevated at 2.36. That means fewer individual “whales,” or large holders, are leaning long, but the ones who are have greatly increased their bet sizes, indicating strong institutional conviction.
• $UNI futures open interest surges to near record: Among altcoins, open interest (OI) in futures tied to Uniswap’s $UNI surged to 86.61 million tokens — flirting with an all-time high, up from 76.89 million tokens yesterday. This expansion highlights substantial capital inflows, which are moving in tandem with a 30% explosion in the token’s spot price. This renewed appetite for major DeFi altcoins stems from mounting market optimism surrounding friendly, coordinated crypto regulations from the SEC and CFTC.
• Bullish momentum dominates major tokens’ volume delta: The bullish mood is also reflected in the 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta, which is positive for most major tokens, excluding GRAM, SHIB, HBAR and BNB. A positive reading means bulls are being more aggressive by trading longs at market orders rather than passive limit orders.
• Implied volatility drops to May’s lows: With major events such as the Clarity Act vote, and the Fed and Bank of Japan interest-rate meetings out of the way, bitcoin’s annualized 30-day implied volatility index, BVIV, dropped to 36%. That level has been a floor since May. The decline points to expectations for near-term market calm.
• Options skew turns short-term bullish for $BTC and $ETH: In options listed on Deribit, $BTC’s one-week put-call skew has turned positive, pointing to relative richness of calls, or bullish bets, over puts. However, one- and two-month skews still show a slight put bias. $ETH’s one-week skew also shows bullishness. The 24-hour volume rankings, however, show a mixed sentiment, with both $BTC call and puts featuring in the most active list.

Token talk

• The DeFi Select Index’s advance on Friday rested largely on uniswap ($UNI), up 13% since midnight UTC and 25% over the past 24 hours, with ethena (ENA) gaining 9.6% and liquid-staking token lido

  LDO$0.3777

  adding 6.6%.

• Layer-2 tokens matched DeFi’s strength, led by starknet $STRK$70.95·Market Closed at 18% on the day and 21% over 24 hours, with arbitrum

  $ARB$0.2074

  up 17% and 25%, stacks

  STX$0.2761

  up 9.2% and optimism

  OP$0.1096

  up 8.9%. $STRK is now at its highest since June 19 while $ARB, at 20.9 cents, hasn’t been this pricey since January.

• Solana (SOL) added 4.5% to $106.14, but the sharper move sat in its ecosystem, where solana-based DEX token raydium

  RAY$1.7446

  rose 16% to $1.71 and liquid-staking token jito

  JTO$0.4544

  lagged at 1.6%, a split that points at DEX volume rather than a blanket bid for the chain.

• Thursday’s leader stalled. Zcash (ZEC) traded at $1,490.10 for a gain of 1.6% on the day against 7.6% over 24 hours, meaning almost all of the advance took place on Thursday. Rival privacy token dash

  DASH$59.37

  was one of only two CoinDesk 100 constituents in the red, losing 0.53%, alongside world liberty financial

  WLFI$0.05829

  , which fell 0.31%.

• CoinMarketCap’s “Altcoin Season” index is now at 44/100 have risen from Tuesday’s low of 32/100, a sign that speculation is the overarching theme on Friday.