Ethereum Treasury Surge

In case you missed it! Our recap of last week’s reports:

• DeFi Analytics 8th August 2025
• Bybit x Block Scholes Quarterly Report: Altcoin season and the evolving role of Bitcoin
• Block Scholes x Bybit Crypto Derivatives

Daily Updates:

• Ethereum treasury companies are on a rampant buying spree of Ether which is currently trading at $4,300.
• BitMine, a Bitcoin miner turned digital-asset treasury for Ether tokens, has become the largest ETH treasury in the world. The company’s ETH holdings are now worth ~$4.96B, equating to 1,150,263 ETH. 
• BitMine launched its ETH Treasury strategy on June 30, 2025 and in that time frame has now become the third largest crypto treasury in the world, with MicroStrategy and Marathon Digital Holdings, the only two larger digital asset treasury firms. 

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• Additionally, SharpLink Gaming, a Nasdaq-listed company, announced yesterday that it has “entered into securities purchase agreements for an aggregate of $400M with five global institutional investors”. 
• The company's current Ether holdings total approximately 598,800 ETH, with another $200M in ATM proceeds yet to be deployed to buy Ether. 
• Joseph Chalom, Co-Chief Executive Officer of SharpLink stated: “Raising nearly $900M in capital over the past week underscores the market’s confidence in SharpLink’s ETH treasury strategy. The speed and scale of these investments reflect not only investor trust in SharpLink, but also the growing recognition of Ethereum’s transformative potential.”

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• The demand for the Ethereum network’s native token has not stopped at corporate treasurers either. Yesterday Spot ETH ETFs saw their largest inflows on-record and their first ever day of inflows above $1B. Collectively, the nine Spot products purchased $1.018B worth of Ether, a huge increase from the second largest day of inflows on the 16th of July, where inflows amounted to $726.6M. 
• Yesterday’s inflows also far exceeded inflows in their BTC Spot ETF counterparts, which purchased $178.1M of Bitcoins. 

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• Ethereum futures trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) hit unprecedented levels in July, with monthly volume climbing 82% from June to a record $118B. Open interest also soared 75%, from $2.97B to an all-time high of $5.21B.

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• Despite the voracious demand, options markets in ETH are yet to price in the same exuberant levels of bullish sentiment seen earlier last month in July. However, they do nonetheless paint a strong picture of traders speculating on higher prices. Volatility smiles are skewed towards OTM call options, as the 25-delta put-call skew is close to 5% for 7-day ETH options, suggesting that call options are in more demand than put options. 
• Both BTC and ETH futures yield term structures are also inverted, with ETH 7-day futures yields close to 10%. 

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• Tokyo-listed bitcoin treasury firm Metaplanet announced today that it purchased an additional 518 BTC for roughly $61.4M, at an average price of $118,519 per bitcoin. The acquisition lifts its total holdings to 18,113 BTC, worth $1.85B based on purchase prices, ranking the firm sixth worldwide by total bitcoin reserves.
• CEO Simon Gerovich said the buy reinforces Metaplanet’s long-term bitcoin accumulation strategy, which earlier this month saw the company outline plans to raise up to ¥555 billion ($3.7B) via perpetual preferred shares to fund further purchases.

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• In Wall Street, risk-on sentiment yesterday was slightly more subdued. US equities, as measured by the S&P 500, ended the day 0.25% lower after climbing to the brink of an all-time high. 
• Markets barely responded to President Trump’s decision to extend his tariff pause against China for another 90 days.
• Trump signed an executive order extending the US-China detente until November 10, 2025, further delaying a tariff hike that was set for Tuesday of at least 54% on Chinese goods. 
• Earlier in the year, the US President increased tariffs on China to 145%. The two sides reached a 90-day truce in May where the US lowered its levies on China to 30% while US goods entering the US are subject to 10% tariffs.
• On social media, Trump also confirmed that imports of gold will not face US tariffs: “Gold will not be Tariffed!” he said on Truth Social.

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• Decentralized oracle provider UMA (Universal Market Access) is tightening controls on Polymarket’s resolution process. On Aug. 6, UMA’s community approved proposal UMIP-189, intended to replace its Optimistic Oracle V2 with the new Managed Optimistic Oracle V2 (MOOV2). 
• The upgrade limits market resolution proposals to a whitelist of experienced users, aiming to reduce disputes, curb manipulation, and improve accuracy in straightforward markets like sports results and crypto prices. Testing with live rewards is already underway on Polygon, with full migration expected soon.

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• U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer in New York has scheduled a “change of plea hearing” for Tuesday for Terraform Labs Pte. co-founder Do Kwon, 33, in a U.S. fraud case tied to the $40B collapse of the TerraUSD stablecoin in 2022, where Kwon will need to explain how he broke the law if he changes his plea from not guilty.
• The hearing follows a two-year extradition dispute over whether Kwon would be prosecuted first in the U.S. or South Korea, with charges filed against him in both countries.

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• In a now deleted job posting, crypto investment firm Paradigm, and global financial infrastructure and payments company Stripe are partnering to create a new blockchain called Tempo, “a high-performance, payments-focused blockchain”.
• The blockchain has not been publicly announced by either firm, with the role  residing in the Stealth Projects department and including the responsibility of creating a launch strategy for the mainnet.

This Week’s Calendar:

Charts of the Day:

Figure 1. BTC at-the-money implied volatility across selected tenors. Source: Deribit, Block Scholes

Figure 2. ETH at-the-money implied volatility across selected tenors. Source: Deribit, Block Scholes

Figure 3. BTC 25-delta put-call skew ratio across selected tenors. Source: Deribit, Block Scholes

Figure 4. ETH 25-delta put-call skew ratio across selected tenors. Source: Deribit, Block Scholes