Bitcoin dipped 2.2% within the dayand the low was made not by the exchange but by those who gave up on their own: two big longs closed at a loss right next to the bottom, while the whales' short grew over the same day.
Case No. 20261023 · 23.10.2026 05:37 UTC · BTC$81,620 / ETH$2,397 · analysis: Fable 5.1 by Anthropic
📅YESTERDAY
Thursday's expiry 22.10 settled at 08:00 UTC: bitcoin at $82,174, inside the market-maker corridor $80,500–84,000 fixed a day before expiry; max pain by the registry, fixed at the same time, was $82,500 — 0.4% from the settlement, which counts as a match. Yesterday's morning radar, a few hours before the expiry, showed a narrower corridor, $82,000–83,500, and max pain at $83,000 — the registry takes what was fixed a day before. Ether settled at $2,427, also inside its corridor, $2,320–2,500; max pain$2,400 — close, but not a match. One case closed — a bitcoin condor for this expiry, in the black; closed cases in the registry now number 886.
Of the positions yesterday's radar said to watch: of the two longs with liquidation lines under the market, the exchange force-closed one in full and the second only in part, in the morning at 09:09–09:12 UTC — and its owner then added; the day's account in ether was closed by its owner, at a loss; the short that came back to the top was closed by its owner, in the black.
⚡THE GIST
• Since yesterday's morning snapshot bitcoin is down 1.3% and ether 1.6%. In between, on the Hyperliquid perp bitcoin went from $82,863 at 06:00 UTC to a low of $80,911 at 16:53 — 2.2% below yesterday's snapshot — held between $81,000 and $81,600 until midnight, then overnight rose to $82,000; ether's low was $2,359.
• The day's low wasn't set by forced closures: at 16:31–16:54 UTC two big longs — one in bitcoin, one in ether — finished closing on their own, both at a loss, and the ether one flipped into a short within a minute. The exchange force-closed two — in the morning, on the first wave of the fall.
• The whales' bitcoin short grew over the day: on the constant set of addresses shorts grew by 892BTC and longs by 84, and the tilt moved toward short by about $66M. In ether two more accounts flipped from long to short.
• On the other side — those buying the dip with leverage: long fuel has gathered under the market again. Within 5% of bitcoin's price — $46.9M of long liquidation lines against $23.2M yesterday; short lines above the price within 2% — none.
• Verdict — continuation ⟳: the whales stand short and deepened it on the fall, while the crowd bought longs on that same fall — the gap in bitcoin widened by 6.4 points.
• 📊 Our Polygon — Pendulum: the best of four versions, −$122 on the day, +$8,041 in total since 11.05.
• 📊 Our Polygon — signals: best — Dust Strategy V2 +$77,219 at a 4% win rate · worst — Wheel Trail V8 −$10,812. Table at the bottom.
🐋WHALES: WHAT CHANGED — three arenas
Arena one — Hyperliquid futures. We measure the day's change in coins between the 05:16 UTC snapshots — on the constant set and on all addresses of both snapshots; there is no 04:16 snapshot today, so the window runs from 05:16 yesterday (how we track whale positions). In BTC on the constant set — 121 addresses — shorts grew by 892BTC and longs by 84: the tilt moved toward short by about $66M. The short was added mostly by three large accounts, and one more opened a new one. Across all addresses the shift is smaller — about $41M toward short: new longs bought on the dip entered the sample and several shorts left it — that outweighed the longs that gave up or were closed by the exchange and also left. In ETH on the constant set longs shrank by 8,378 ETH and shorts grew by 3,567 — a tilt toward short of about $29M; almost all of the long side of that shift is the two accounts that flipped into a short. Across the registry — among positions with a liquidation price — at the 05:16 UTC snapshot: BTC long $139.5M against a short of $754.9M, yesterday at 04:16 — $126.0M and $702.6M. The short is 5.4 times the long against 5.6 yesterday: both sides grew, the long faster, because on the fall it was being added at high leverage. ETH — $294.4M against $691.0M, the long share 29.9% against 32.5%. Overleveraged whales number 61 against 60 yesterday, $871M of positions together against $856M; the longs among them are 56% against 62%. Among the addresses we track, two were force-closed, both longs, in the morning.
Arena two — Deribit options. Over Thursday and Friday morning, in the two-day window, 59 structures were recognised in bitcoin and 22 in ether — against 66 and 6 in yesterday's window. There were no large blocks in bitcoin. The most notable — twice in the day, at 14:15 and 19:02 UTC, the same trade: a butterfly of calls for the end of November, which gains the most if bitcoin is then well above today's level. In ether at 11:40 UTC, within a minute, protection against a fall was bought for today's expiry — in five blocks. Quiet accumulation outside the blocks over the week (what a block is): in bitcoin calls far above the market for 30.10 are being unwound — two of the three largest positions; the third is a rise in November calls at the level of the day's butterfly, but more than half of it came from the butterfly itself. In ether the most was added in puts below the market — both on far expiries and on today's and tomorrow's.
Arena three — money at the exchange border. The snapshot runs to 05:25 UTC; the last transfer above $250k was today at 03:38 UTC. Over seven days $44.5M was brought into the exchange and $23.6M taken out: $20.9M more arrived than left, against $43.0M yesterday — the weekly window has shifted, and last week's big bitcoin deposits have dropped out of it. In the day since yesterday's radar $5.2M came in and $7.5M went out — yesterday $8.0M and $5.2M: the border has turned to withdrawals, most of it USDC to exchange deposit addresses. In the weekly window $14.2M more bitcoin arrived than left — mostly from exchanges; USDC cash — $3.3M more; ether — $2.5M; SOL — $1.7M; of ZEC, $0.8M more left than arrived.
This is positioning, not a direction forecast.
🧭CROSS-CHECK — five camps of witnesses
What the funds are doing. Spot ETFs are the only camp that measures purchases of the coin itself, not a leveraged position. There are no fresh figures: the SoSoValue data source hasn't answered since 09.10, the latest are for Thursday 08.10. This camp is silent: no data.
What the options market says. This camp measures one thing: what insurance costs on the Deribit book. BTCskew is +3.4 against +3.7 yesterday — puts got slightly cheaper relative to calls (what skew is). In ETH+2.8 against +2.3. BTC two-day vol sits in the 11th percentile since February against the 26th yesterday; ETH — in the 15th against the 21st (what implied vol is). Our fear-and-greed index stands at 56 out of 100 against 54 yesterday — the neutral zone. This camp is silent: insurance didn't get dearer on the fall — on the contrary, the nearest vol got even cheaper.
What the futures say. This camp measures who pays whom to hold a position. BTC funding on Hyperliquid is +0.010% in eight-hour terms, as yesterday; on Binance +0.008% against −0.002% (what funding is). In ETH+0.006% on Hyperliquid against +0.010%, and +0.008% on Binance against +0.000%. This camp is silent: longs pay the usual price — nobody is overpaying on either side.
What the crowd is doing. This camp measures how retail accounts stand against the whales. On Bybit perps at 05:34 UTC 66.9% of BTC accounts stand long against 60.1% yesterday at 04:15; in ETH73.5% against 71.5%. The whales' long share in bitcoin — 15.6% against 15.2%, in ether 29.9% against 32.5%. This camp contradicts the whales: the crowd bought longs on the fall, the whales — the short. The gap in bitcoin widened by 6.4 points over the day, to 51.3; in ether — to 43.6, and by our gap beacon that is the widest in a month.
Any signs of stress. This camp measures whether anyone has already been forced out of the market. On OKX swaps $0.5M was liquidated over the day, all of it longs, against $2.4M yesterday, when 69% were shorts; that is 10% of the week's liquidations. Among the Hyperliquid addresses we track two were force-closed, both longs, on the first wave of the fall. This camp confirms the whales: only longs were forced out — but few, and the day's low itself wasn't made by liquidations.
Again: this is positioning, not a direction forecast.
🌡ALTSEASON — the classic and our barometer
The classic altseason index is 47.4 out of 100 on a list of 274 alts against 46.1 yesterday on a list of 254; the lists differ, so the comparison is rough. This is the transition zone: altseason starts at 75, bitcoin season sits below 25.
Our barometer watches money, not prices: open interest, funding and retail come from Bybit perps, the whales from the Hyperliquid registry. Alts' share of open interest is 40.8% — $4.84B of $11.86B against 41.5% yesterday.
Alt contracts with funding hotter than bitcoin's make up 45.4% of open interest against 32.8% yesterday. This measure swings between extremes from one day to the next, so we don't treat a difference like this as a move.
Retail in the top-10 coins stands 75.4% long against 73.3%.
Whales in alts are structurally short: 22.6% long across $1.17B of positions, the largest of them HYPE. That gap itself is permanent, the signal is in its CHANGE — over the day the whales' long share fell by 3.5 points, from 26.1%.
Full barometer: indiciadesk.com/en/altseason
⚖️VERDICT OF THE DAY
continuation ⟳ — the whales stand short and deepened it on the fall: on the constant set of addresses the bitcoin short grew by 892BTC, while price is down 1.3% from yesterday's snapshot. The witnesses: the crowd stands against the whales, with the gap in ether the widest in a month; stress sides with the whales, but weakly; options and futures are silent, the funds have no data.
What this does NOT mean. It isn't a forecast of a further fall: the day's low was made not by liquidations but by big accounts that gave up on their own — and price came back above it. The long fuel gathered under the market means a bigger range of a move down for the same push, not a higher probability of that move.
🔒In today's full RADAR:
• who gave up right at the bottom, who flipped into a short there — and who bought the dip with high leverage that same evening;
• the structure of the day: a butterfly assembled twice in one day — the premium, the expiry and where it gains the most.
ANALYST access → indiciadesk.com/en/agent
💎DEEP
🔒WHALES IN DETAIL 💠
Portraits from the Hyperliquid registry, snapshot 05:16 UTC; the day's change is measured between the 05:16 snapshots, in coins; the moves of individual addresses come from the trade records. Distance to liquidation is from the header spot. Nicknames aren't treated as identification.
The long that gave up at the bottom. Yesterday at the 05:16 UTC snapshot — LONG 286.9BTC ($23.7M) at 20× from $83,408, liquidation far away, at $51,941. At 16:47–16:54 UTC, right at the day's low, the owner sold everything at $80,920–81,300: −$666k. There was no forcing — the liquidation line lay 36% lower. This morning no positions. The ether long that flipped into a short. LONG 8,387 ETH ($20.5M) at 20× from $2,465 — the owner was closing it from 09:10 UTC, the main part at 16:31–16:44, 8,720 ETH in total at $2,382–2,402, −$659k. A minute later, at 16:45–19:31, he opened a SHORT of 7,293 ETH at $2,377–2,391. This morning — SHORT 7,293 ETH ($17.5M) at 20× from $2,380, liquidation at $4,477. One more ether flip. The address that yesterday held ETH LONG 751 and BTC SHORT 75 closed the ether long at 16:03 UTC, −$48k, and by 02:12 opened a SHORT of 8,250 ETH at $2,377–2,398, buying part of it back in the black. The bitcoin short it closed in the black, +$88k. This morning SHORT 6,250 ETH ($15.0M) at 25× from $2,384, liquidation at $2,588 — 8.0% above the market. Two longs hit by forced closures. Yesterday's long fuel under the market went off in the morning. The LONG of 84.9BTC at 40× added at 07:50 UTC to 121.3 — and at 09:12 the exchange closed all of it at $81,642–81,661: −$178k. The LONG of 120BTC at 40× lost 24BTC by force at 09:09, at $81,724–81,733, −$37k — and instead of leaving, added: over the day it took on another 174BTC, several times cutting on bounces at a loss. This morning LONG 180BTC ($14.7M) at 40× from $82,182, liquidation at $78,801 — 3.5% under the market. The short on the edge — closed by its owner, in the black. Yesterday at 08:10–01:41 UTC the address closed the short in parts and opened it again: it closed 592.5BTC, +$139k, and 812ETH, +$28k; this morning no positions. The former ether short-seller — flipped several times over the day and gave back more than it earned yesterday. Over the day shorts of 933BTC were closed at −$196k, longs of 320BTC sold near the bottom, at 16:48–18:03 UTC, at −$266k. This morning LONG 92BTC ($7.5M) at 40× from $81,905, liquidation at $80,861 — 0.9% under the market: that is almost all of the long fuel within 2%. Who bought the dip with leverage. The 40× short that closed in the black on the night of 22.10 opened at 09:31–18:55 UTC a LONG of 300BTC at $81,372–81,800: this morning $24.6M at 40× from $81,657, uPnL +$61k, liquidation at $74,007 — 9.3% under the market. An address new to the registry — LONG 139.2BTC ($11.4M) at 40× from $81,495, liquidation at $79,862 — 2.2% under. The day's account in ether, which yesterday at 08:03–09:01 closed its long itself, −$78k, today at 02:43–03:13 UTC opened LONG 126.5BTC ($10.4M) at 30× and LONG 3,578 ETH ($8.6M) at 25×: liquidation at $78,817 and $2,295 — 3.4% and 4.3% under the market. One more address added 100BTC and 3,000 ETH of long: BTC LONG $33.7M at 40× from $82,333, liquidation at $76,949 — 5.7% under. Who added short. The self-named address that added 305BTC of short over the day: SHORT 333.4BTC ($27.3M) from $82,000 on an account of $50.5M — the effective leverage is low. A new position — SHORT 150BTC ($12.3M) at 40× from $81,307. Two more addresses added 274 and 239BTC — they appear below, in 🔬. The largest short house. Two addresses: BTC SHORT $215.9M from $76,327, uPnL −$14.6M, and BTC SHORT $206.0M from $78,114, uPnL −$9.4M; ETH SHORT $255.9M and $159.4M. Together with ether the unrealised loss is $34.5M against $47.1M yesterday — the fall lightened the shorts. Their $421.9M make up 55.9% of the registry's bitcoin short side against 60.5% yesterday: the share fell because others added short. The largest ether long at 10× — LONG $116.6M from $2,610, uPnL −$10.0M, liquidation at $2,256 — 5.9% under the market. The market's biggest gain — ETH LONG $72.8M at 20× from $2,134, uPnL +$8.2M.
The structure of the day — the same butterfly twice. Yesterday at 14:15 and 19:02 UTC, with bitcoin near $81,500 and $81,250, the same shape went through in two blocks of equal size for 27.11: 250 calls each at $90,000 and $106,000 bought, 500 at $98,000 sold. 2,000 contracts in total, premium ≈3.7BTC paid. The package gains the most if on 27.11 bitcoin is near $98,000 — up to ≈$1.85M per block; it is in the black between ≈$90,600 and ≈$105,400; below $90,000 only the premium is lost. From the current spot the lower edge of profit is 11% higher. Over the week open interest at $98,000 grew by 1,870 calls, 77% on 27.11; ≈1,000 of them are the butterfly blocks themselves.
Cases in the registry — three new, all in bitcoin; 185 open. Case No. 1209 · BTC, a risk reversal, this morning: 100 puts at $75,000 for 06.11 sold, 100 calls at $95,000 for 26.03.2027 bought; premium ≈4.35BTC paid. It loses if on 06.11 bitcoin is below $75,000 — 8.1% under spot; the March call gains only above $95,000.
Payoff profile at the 2026-11-06 expiry. The whale paid $356k in premium. Breakeven: $98,555.
Case No. 1210 and No. 1211 · BTC, two small put ratio spreads with the bought leg on today's expiry: 20 and 12.5 puts at $82,000 for 23.10 bought, 30 puts at $81,500 for 24.10 and 25 puts at $81,000 for 06.11 sold.
Payoff profile at the 2026-10-23 expiry. The whale received $5k in premium. Breakeven: $80,034.
Payoff profile at the 2026-10-23 expiry. The whale received $46k in premium. Breakeven: $76,347.
Case No. 1197 · BTC: 500 calls at $90,000 bought, 500 at $95,000 sold, both for 06.11. The lower strike is 10.3% above spot against 8.8% yesterday.
Payoff profile at the 2026-11-06 expiry. The whale paid $183k in premium. Breakeven: $90,365.
Case No. 1081 · a BTC risk reversal: a synthetic short from $69,000 for 30.10.2026, premium ≈9.61BTC received. From the $75,860 entry spot has moved 7.6% against this position — yesterday it was 9.0%.
Payoff profile at the 2026-10-30 expiry. The whale received $729k in premium. Breakeven: $76,290.
The tape outside the case registry. In ether at 11:40–11:41 UTC — five blocks, 6,000 puts at $2,300 in total for today's expiry, ≈9.3ETH of premium paid: protection below $2,300, 4.0% under spot. In bitcoin at midnight, at 00:27–00:28 UTC — two packages of the same four-leg shape for 25.12 on calls at $72,000–96,000, 1,313 contracts in total, ≈2.3BTC of premium received. ΔOI over the week:BTC: −3,208 calls at $95,000, 95% on 30.10; −2,691 at $100,000, all on 30.10; +1,870 calls at $98,000, 77% on 27.11. ETH: +15,065 puts at $2,200, over 11 expiries; +14,103 puts at $2,300, 77% on 23.10 and 24.10; +10,548 calls at $2,500, over 10 expiries.
🔬Who exactly
The largest short house is Abraxas Capital Mgmt (Heka Funds): two addresses, $421.9M of bitcoin short together and $415.3M in ether, $34.5M of unrealised loss.
The address with the Arkham label Fasanara Capital moved its short back into bitcoin: +274BTC and −2,271ETH between the snapshots. This morning BTC SHORT $47.1M at 30× from $81,941 and ETH SHORT $53.6M at 25× from $2,501, uPnL in ether +$2.2M.
The address with the Arkham label Wintermute — a market maker — cut its shorts: BTC from 386.7 to 111.1, ETH from 17,368 to 12,225. A market maker's short may be a hedge, so we don't take a direction from it.
The self-named address VBVIT added 239BTC of short: BTC SHORT $48.0M at 25× from $82,072. A self-assigned name isn't identification. The rest of the portraits above — the long that gave up at the bottom, both ether flips, the longs under the market and the new shorts — carry no public Arkham labels; several of them have self-assigned names, but we don't use those.
Money by address. Over seven days the largest bitcoin deposits — from Binance, $12.9M of $15.8M. The day's largest deposit — $3.0M and $1.0M USDC from a private address to the account that in yesterday's radar grew its ether short. The day's largest withdrawal — $3.1M USDC in six tranches of $0.4–0.6M to an OKX deposit address; another $1.8M to a Binance deposit address. The 25× ether long that shrank over the day from 15,220 to 10,000 ETH brought in $0.5M USDC at 16:44 UTC, near the bottom — its line moved from $2,292 to $2,187. Fasanara brought in $0.38M.
🔒THE WEEK'S DYNAMICS 🔬
Perps on a constant set of addresses. Over 7 days, between the 16.10 and 23.10 snapshots at 04:46 UTC, on 120 addresses: BTC — about $164M into the short, ETH — about $45M into the short; across all addresses of both snapshots — about $152M and $59M. Yesterday the weekly window gave about $55M and $11M: in one day Thursday's fall itself entered it, so we don't treat the difference as a weekly trend — it is a single day that carries the weight.
Gamma flip. Computed at 05:53 UTC: BTC across the whole book $80,112 against $79,650 yesterday — spot 1.9% above it (what the flip is). On the near expiries the flip at 2–7 days is $81,956–82,000 — spot under it, as yesterday; at 14–30 days $81,215–81,299 — spot above it. ETH across the whole book $2,404 against $2,376 — spot at $2,397 has dropped under it: across the whole ether book dealers now amplify the move rather than damp it; at 2–7 days $2,434 — above the market for at least a seventh day.
The price of fear. On the weekly window the premium is +4.8 against +4.3 yesterday: IV38.0 against the actual weekly HV 33.1, the difference computed from unrounded numbers.
🔒CROSS-CHECK IN DETAIL 💠
BTC levels. Everything below comes from the Deribit options book unless stated otherwise. Today's weekly expiry 23.10, at 08:00 UTC: max pain$82,000 across the combined book and on Deribit, $82,250 on Bybit (what max pain is); put $78,000 (2,024 contracts), call $90,000 (822) (what the walls are). The market-maker corridor for today — $81,000–83,500, spot inside it. 30.10: max pain$78,000 across the combined book and on Deribit, $82,000 on Bybit; put wall $70,000 (4,404), call wall $95,000 (20,008). 30.10 and 25.12 each hold a third of all bitcoin contracts.
ETH levels. 23.10: max pain$2,450 across the combined book and on Deribit, $2,430 on Bybit; put $2,300 (12,579), call $2,850 (4,847). The market-maker corridor — $2,380–2,600. 30.10: max pain$2,500, put wall $2,300 (25,570), call wall $2,600 (37,657).
Fuel. At the 05:16 UTC snapshot, under BTC within 5% of the price at the time ($77,768–85,954) there are $46.9M of long positions against $23.2M yesterday; above it — $16.4M of shorts against $20.6M. Between the market and −2% — $7.7M of long lines against $17.0M yesterday, and almost all of it is one account with its line at $80,861; between the market and +2% there are no short lines at all, yesterday — $11.9M. The nearest short line is $83,521, 2.3% above the header spot; up to $84,631 — three more small ones, four together at $8.2M; the same amount sits on a single line at $85,133, 4.3% above. In ETH under the market within 5% — $9.9M of longs against $8.9M, of which $8.6M is one account with its line at $2,295; above the market — $0.5M. This is about the RANGE of a move for the same push, not about a higher probability of that move (what the fuel map is).
Gamma vacuum. In BTC there are no empty zones above the market; below it $76,000–77,000 is empty; in ETH — $2,250–2,300 under the market.
Stress test ±2%. From the header spot: in bitcoin a 2% fall ($79,988) is under the long line at $80,861 and under the whole-book flip at $80,112, but still above the line at $79,862; above, +2% ($83,252) is past the near flips, and only 0.3% under the nearest short line at $83,521 and under the $90,000 call wall. In ether −2% ($2,349) is under the long line at $2,363, above $2,295; +2% ($2,445) is above the near flip at $2,434.
OI flow.BTC put/call across all expiries: month 0.54 · week 0.62 · now 0.60. ETH0.54 · 0.53 · 0.50 (what put/call is).
Two options books. On the same expiries up to 30 days BTC put/call is 0.60 on Deribit against 1.32 on Bybit; ETH0.91 and 0.86.
IV by tenor.BTC 2d P26/C24 · 7d P34/C32 · 35d P39/C35, percentiles since February for the 7- and 35-day — 19th and 35th; the two-day is in the cross-check above. ETH 2d P40/C34 · 7d P49/C46 · 35d P51/C48, percentiles 15th, 29th and 26th. Day to day we compare only the two-day tenor: yesterday BTC P32, ETH P39. BTCDVOL37.8 against 30-day realised HV32.6 — a premium of +5.2, as yesterday; ETHDVOL51.1 against HV48.7 — +2.4 against +1.7 (what the premium is).
💎SCENARIOS IN DETAIL 💠
The code's verdicts. Of the scenarios from 21.10, the code recorded "Squeeze up through the short fuel" (rated 25%) as cancelled at its level — the $81,132 low against the $81,400 level. By the sequence of events price touched the trigger first — on 21.10, $84,758 against $84,700 — and the level only on 22.10, around 16:00 UTC; the code's rule checks the level first and doesn't weigh the order. The tally uses the code's verdict. "The corridor" from 21.10 closes at 08:44 UTC — after this snapshot. The scenarios from 22.10 stay open until 24.10: on hourly closes the low was $81,132, so the code hasn't yet counted the "Slide" trigger at $81,050; on Hyperliquid's 15-minute bars the low was $80,911.
The all-time tally (N counts only those that reached a verdict): squeeze up through the short fuel — 18 of 43, 19 more cancelled at their level; corridor — 27 of 52 plus 14 partial, 5 more cancelled; slide into the long fuel — 16 of 34, 17 more cancelled. The directional types are still no better than a coin toss.
The corridor holds — 50%. ⏱ 2 days, to 25.10. BTC stays within the near 2% of the market: $79,990–$83,250. The long line at $80,861 lies inside the corridor, and right above $83,250 — four small short lines, $83,521–84,631, $8.2M together. Cancellation level: a touch of $77,540 — 5% below the header spot.
Slide into the long fuel — 25%. ⏱ 2 days, to 25.10. Trigger: a touch of $79,990 — a break below the near 2%, under the long line at $80,861 and under the whole-book gamma flip at $80,112. Cancellation level: a touch of $83,250.
Bounce past the near flips — 25%. ⏱ 2 days, to 25.10. Trigger: a touch of $83,250 — a break above the near 2%, past the 2–7 day flips. Right past the trigger — small short lines of $8.2M ($83,521–84,631), a larger one at $85,133: fuel on that path is small, but present. Cancellation level: a touch of $79,990.
This is how we weigh the odds — not a promise; the code will compute the verdict from spot history.
🔭WHAT TO WATCH
• The 40× long that flipped several times over the day: line at $80,861 — 0.9% under the market (💠).
• The longs bought on the dip: lines at $79,862, $78,817 and $78,801 — 2.2–3.5% under the market (💠).
• Ether under the whole-book gamma flip, $2,404: a return above it would switch the dealers' regime back (💠).
🆓TAIL
📊POLYGON
(our own signals at real prices, not a backtest)
⚙️Pendulum · Wheel(the best of four versions, live curve on real prices)
−$122 on the day · +$8,041 in total · since 11.05.2026
⭐ Top-5 signals($1,000 per signal; "total" is the sum of all trades, not the return on a single thousand):
signal trades win last total since
Dust Strategy V2 514%−$1,125+$77,219 21.03
Dust Strategy V1 417%−$1,125+$25,809 20.03
Volatility Convergence V3 4134%−$454+$9,803 26.05
Skew 2.0 V2 5131%−$789+$4,801 26.05
Fear Flash V3 1127%−$139+$1,766 23.05
Deepest in the red: Wheel Trail V8 −$10,812 · Wheel Trail V6 −$9,823 · Wheel Trail V7 −$8,763 — three versions of one signal that hunts a reversal and pays for every attempt while the trend runs. Over the day one trade closed in the top five, at a loss: Volatility Convergence V3 −$454; the Pendulum lost $122 on the day. The most profitable signal wins only 4% of its 51 trades. Win rate isn't money.
📅PUBLIC LEDGER
(computed by code at the settlement price)
The market-maker corridor. Across 458 expiries since February the market-maker break-even corridor fixed a day before expiry held the settlement price 373 times — 81%. Yesterday's Thursday expiry it held in both bitcoin and ether. Decision: we lean on the corridor knowing that roughly one expiry in five it doesn't hold.
Max pain. A match with the settlement in 171 of those same 458 expiries, 37%; yesterday — yes in bitcoin, no in ether. Decision: we don't chase max pain.
The walls. The call wall held the settlement in 79 of 159 expiries where price reached it — 50%; the put wall in 49 of 114, 43%. Yesterday price reached neither wall. Decision: we don't publish a wall without an expiry and a contract count, nor its percentage without a base.
Whale structures. The registry: 886 closed cases (5 of them from Bybit); across the 879 with a score, −$18.93M in total for the whales. Decision: win rate isn't money, and we don't copy whale structures — we track where they stand.
Polygon. Pendulum +$8,041 since 11.05 with −$122 on the day — both numbers from one series, the live curve of the best of four versions. Decision: we publish the tally daily with the same denominator and with the version's name.
📏Scale calibrator
• What protection costs. Our fear-and-greed index — 56 out of 100 against 54 yesterday. We compute it from the price of volatility and the option skew on Deribit, not from news, which is why it diverges from the well-known index.
• Cheap or expensive for this market itself.BTC two-day vol — 11th percentile of the hourly history since February, seven-day — 19th, 35 days out — 35th: insurance is cheaper than usual on every tenor, and on the nearest especially.
• Which way protection tilts.BTCskew+3.4: puts dearer than calls, slightly less so than yesterday's +3.7. Terms: indiciadesk.com/en/glossary/
Not investment advice and not a recommendation to trade. Derivatives trading carries a high risk of loss; INDICIA DESK is a research publisher, not an adviser licensed by MAS, the SEC or the FCA — decisions and their consequences are yours.