Bitcoin remained close to $78,000 on Tuesday as traders took a pause following last week’s sharp rally, while Arbitrum’s ARB token jumped nearly 30% as revenue from Robinhood Chain surged.
BTC was trading around $78,000, down about 0.4% since midnight UTC and roughly 0.7% over the past week. The market has settled into a consolidation phase after a short squeeze propelled Bitcoin from below $63,000 to nearly $81,400 last week.
Bitcoin has continued to outperform traditional risk assets during the pullback. Nasdaq 100 futures were down approximately 0.5% since midnight, highlighting the cryptocurrency’s relative strength.
Demand for spot Bitcoin ETFs remains a key source of support. The funds recorded nine consecutive days of inflows totaling about $3.04 billion before a $202 million outflow on Friday ended the streak. Buying resumed Monday, with roughly $217 million flowing into the products, according to SoSoValue.
Altcoin performance was less convincing. The Altcoin Season Index fell to 26 out of 100 from 34 on Friday, its lowest reading in more than three months.
Crypto Derivatives Stay Neutral
Futures traders showed little directional conviction for a second straight day. The 24-hour taker buy-sell ratio remained balanced, while total open interest hovered near $136 billion.
Futures trading volume declined by about 7%, suggesting participants are mostly waiting for stronger signals before committing to new long or short positions.
ARB was the biggest gainer among the top 100 tokens, rising almost 30%. Open interest in ARB futures climbed more than 10%, indicating that traders were adding exposure as the token attempted to break through resistance near 11 cents.
Annualized funding rates near 8% suggest that leverage has not yet reached excessive levels.
Monero also attracted additional futures activity. XMR open interest reached about 640,000 tokens, its highest level since February 2024. Funding rates have fallen to approximately 15% from more than 50%, easing concerns that bullish positioning is becoming overcrowded.
However, the negative 24-hour open-interest-adjusted cumulative volume delta indicates that sellers still have influence. XMR fell to roughly $525 after touching $548 on Monday.
Tron presented a more heavily bearish positioning profile. TRX funding rates were around minus 80%, pointing to a crowded short trade. The token has fallen for three consecutive days and was trading near 33 cents.
Bitcoin and Ether futures open interest remained relatively low, sitting near multi-week lows.
Volatility measures have also eased. Bitcoin’s and Ether’s 30-day implied volatility indexes, BVIV and EVIV, have both moved lower from their mid-August peaks, reflecting reduced expectations for large near-term price swings.
Options trading remained more optimistic. The $80,000 Bitcoin call expiring Sept. 25 was the most active Deribit contract during the previous 20 hours. In Ether options, the $2,500 call attracted the most trading activity.
Robinhood Chain Revenue Lifts Arbitrum
ARB’s rally has been closely linked to increasing activity on Robinhood Chain, a dedicated blockchain built on Arbitrum technology.
Robinhood Chain allocates 10% of its net protocol revenue to the Arbitrum ecosystem. Offchain Labs co-founder Steven Goldfeder said Monday that transaction revenue surpassed $2 million over a 24-hour period, up sharply from roughly $1.22 million the previous day.
Maintaining that pace would put Arbitrum’s annual share at approximately $73 million.
Lorenzo Valente of ARK Invest also highlighted the acceleration in revenue. His calculations show gross daily revenue rising from $54,676 on Aug. 22 to $1.088 million on Aug. 30, nearly a 20-fold increase. Arbitrum’s portion grew from around $5,400 to $108,000 over the same period.
The broader DeFi sector also showed strength.
CRV, the token linked to Curve DAO, rose around 14% over 24 hours to approximately 35 cents, with trading volume reaching $119 million.
UNI gained about 8% since midnight to around $5.80 after climbing 12% during the previous 24 hours. It is now up roughly 34% over the past week, with about $519 million in trading volume.
Aave gained approximately 1.9% to $126.54, while Morpho rose about 2% to $2.55.
While Bitcoin’s consolidation signals a pause after its August rally, the strong performance of ARB and other DeFi tokens shows that capital is still flowing into specific parts of the crypto market rather than leaving the sector altogether.
