Ether options now biased toward calls for all expiries, analyst says

Amid renewed optimism for potential spot ether exchange-traded fund approvals, ether call options are more expensive than put options for all expires — indicating bullish market sentiment — an analyst said.

"Put minus call skew is negative across all expiries and increasing further beyond the end-of-June expiry, quite a bullish signal — the basis has also increased to around 14% annualized, another bullish indicator," Deribit CEO Luuk Strijers said in an email sent to The Block. 

The analysis suggests traders are willing to pay more for calls than puts, especially for options expiring at the end of June and beyond. This may be a bullish market indicator because it indicates that traders anticipate ether prices will rise in the future. Consequently, they are less inclined to pay higher premiums for downside protection with puts.

Surge in options trading volume

According to Strijers, following the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's surprise request for filing amendments , which renewed optimism about the potential approval of spot ether ETFs this week, the Deribit derivatives exchange experienced nearly unprecedented trading volumes.

"At Deribit, we have observed a marked increase in trading volumes and volatility for ether options and futures. In fact, we recorded an almost unprecedented trading volume of $12.5 billion notional over the last 24 hours," Strijers said.

The Deribit CEO added that the surge reflects heightened market activity and interest as traders and investors position themselves to capitalize on the potential approval of spot ether ETFs this week.  

SEC requests amended to ETF filings

The bullish turnaround in the ether options market began on Monday when firms looking to list and trade shares of spot ether ETFs were asked by the SEC to update and refile important documents.

On Tuesday,  CboeBZX  posted the amended 19b-4 forms for the spot ether ETFs from Franklin Templeton, Fidelity, VanEck, Invesco Galaxy, as well as Ark Invest and 21Shares.

Ether's price increased 1% in the past 24 hours and was changing hands for $3,740 at 6:14 a.m. ET, according to The Block’s Price Page .

The GM 30 Index , representing a selection of the top 30 cryptocurrencies, increased by 0.5% to 148.14 in the same period.