Crypto Markets Today: BNB, AVAX and DOT Lead Futures Trends
Major cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH), XRP (XRP), solana (SOL) and others, are trading on the front foot following Wednesday's interest-rate cut by the Federal Reserve.
Still, some analysts are maintaining a cautious bias.
"The Fed rate cut gave crypto a near-term lift, but the rally is not yet clean," Timothy Misir, head of research, BRN, said in an email. "Institutional flows are supportive overall, yet exchange inflows and a single-day ETF outflow signal distribution into strength."
Misir suggested traders use a bitcoin price band of $115,000–$115,500 as the guardrail for tactical risk management.
Derivatives Positioning
by Omkar Godbole
- BNB, AVAX, and DOT have all seen double-digit increases in futures open interest (OI) in the past 24 hours, reinforcing their price gains of 5% to 9%.
- BTC's cumulative OI in USD and USDT-denominated perpetual futures continues to drop, diverging from the ascending price. Perhaps derivative traders are not participating in the rally. (Check out the Technical Analysis section.)
- BCH, TRX, BNB, BTC, XMR, AVAX, and SUI stand out with a positive open interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta, indicating strong buying pressure.
- There are no signs of overheating even in the further corners of the crypto market, as annualized funding rates for smaller speculative tokens remain at around 10%.
- On the CME, OI in ether futures is again closing on the 2 million ETH mark, while positioning in BTC futures remains considerably light. The annualized three-month basis for both tokens remains below 10%, offering significantly lower yield to carry traders than SOL's 17% return.
- On Deribit, 25-delta risk reversals reveal a neutral to bearish (put) bias in options out to March expiry. In contrast, ether options are bullish across all tenors.
- Block flows on OTC network Paradigm featured demand for the $116K call expiring on Sept. 19 and the $100K put expiring on Oct. 31.
Token Talk
By Oliver Knight
- The altcoin market staged a strong rebound following Wednesday's oversold RSI readings, with several tokens posting gains in excess of 10%.
- Leading the rally is ether.fi (ETHFI), up 12% in the past 24 hours to $1.64, the highest since January.
- BNB also notched a milestone, breaking through $1,000 for the first time as momentum accelerates toward fresh record highs.
- The bullish backdrop comes as bitcoin creeps up toward $117,300, consolidating above critical support at $110,000.
- Meanwhile, bitcoin dominance slipped to 56% at CoinMarketCap, its lowest since early January, highlighting investors’ growing appetite for more speculative investments.
- The decentralized finance (DeFi) sector has been one of the largest beneficiaries of Thursday's move higher, with total value locked (TVL) across all protocols hitting $170 billion, the highest point since April, 2022.
- Hyperliquid's layer-1 blockchain notched a record high of $2.77 billion having risen by 3.88% in 24 hours, while Sui's TVL is up by 3% to $2.1 billion.
Source: Crypto Markets Today: BNB, AVAX and DOT Lead Futures Trends (https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2025/09/18/crypto-markets-today-bnb-avax-and-dot-lead-futures-trends)