Equities Outpace Crypto

Find out our latest reports, listed below:

• DeepBook - “The Backbone of Sui DeFi Liquidity”

• Premia x Block Scholes: Introducing Kyan

• Bybit x Block Scholes Quarterly Report: Rise of Perp DEXs — and how to catch the opportunity

• How did options markets react to the crypto selloff?

Daily Updates:

• A shortened trading session for Christmas Eve still saw US equities hit new all-time highs, while an unexpected drop in unemployment claims alongside Tuesday’s stronger-than-expected Q3 GDP data both support a soft landing for the US economy. 
• The S&P 500 rose for a fifth straight session — up 0.32% yesterday, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq-100 advanced 0.27%. 

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• Initial jobless claims, which shows the number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits unexpectedly dropped to 214,000 for the week ended Dec 20, below the median forecast of 224,000. Jobless claims data is often volatile around holiday seasons, however the data suggests more of the “low hiring, low firing” labour market, that Chair Powell has often described. Continuing claims, i.e., the number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits after an initial week of aid and often used as a proxy for hiring, increased 38,000 however to 1.923M during the week ending Dec 13. 
• Macro data earlier this week also showed the US economy growing at its fastest pace since Q3 2023 in the third quarter of 2025 — markets are still continuing to price for two rate cuts next year, one more than the December FOMC meeting’s median SEP dot plot suggests. 

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• Just as we highlighted in yesterday’s comment, as both traditional haven assets and traditional risk-on equities trade at record levels, BTC continues to splutter at the $90K wall of resistance. 
• Through yesterday and the early part of today, it traded between $85K and $90K, continuing the sideways slog we’ve seen it trade with since the middle of the month. It remains 30% below its October all-time high and is on track for its worst quarterly performance since the depths of the bear market in Q2 2022. 

• The failure to break out past $90K has also occurred alongside the fifth straight outflow day from Spot Bitcoin ETFs. Over the past five trading days alone, Spot ETFs have sold $825.7M worth of bitcoins. 

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• As we approach the end of the year, volatility in both crypto and TradFi markets continues to drop lower. Wall Street’s fear gauge, the VIX, hit its lowest level all year yesterday, while in options markets, BTC and ETH ATM IV have fallen 10 and 12 vol points respectively since the weekend. Skew on the other hand has mostly moved sideways, with vol smiles for both assets continuing to price in a bearish put premium.

Market Snapshot: Overnight Moves

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