Bitcoin rose to near $67,800 even as a stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs report pushed back expectations for Federal Reserve rate cuts. The resilience is feeding a shift in sentiment, with the muted reaction possibly signaling seller exhaustion and a growing appetite for risk despite a tough macro backdrop.
The U.S. added 130,000 jobs in January, nearly double the expected 70,000. The data sharply reduced the odds of an early interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve, pushing expectations out to July. Typically, lowering rate-cut odds would weigh on risk assets such as cryptocurrencies. However, the report also showed job growth remained concentrated in health care-related sectors while other areas were mostly little changed, suggesting the headline figure may be masking cooling across the broader economy.
Bitcoin’s resilience is also being linked to signs of seller exhaustion even as overall sentiment remains weak. The Crypto Fear & Greed Index is at 5, its lowest level since the collapse of FTX in 2022.
Derivatives positioning
- Bearish momentum is stabilizing, with open interest holding steady near $15.8 billion and perpetual funding rates swinging back to neutral or positive.
- Sentiment is notably bullish on Bybit (+9.5%) and Binance (+3.4%), while Hyperliquid is a bearish outlier at -4.5%.
- The three-month basis remains around 2%, suggesting institutional conviction has not yet fully followed the retail-driven shift in funding.
- In bitcoin options, defensive caution is intensifying: the one-week 25-delta skew fell to 19%, and puts now account for 54% of 24-hour volume.
- The implied volatility term structure has shifted into short-term backwardation, reflecting a “panic premium” as traders pay for immediate downside protection.
Liquidations and key levels
- Coinglass data shows $342 million in 24-hour liquidations, with a 49-51 split between longs and shorts.
- BTC ($145 million), ETH ($84 million), and others ($18 million) led notional liquidations.
- Binance’s liquidation heatmap highlights $68,800 as a core liquidation level to monitor if price rises.
Token talk
- BlackRock (BLK) is bringing its $2.2 billion tokenized U.S. Treasury fund, BUIDL, to Uniswap, giving DeFi users access to Treasury yields through the platform.
- This is the first time BlackRock has listed a tokenized product on a decentralized exchange. BlackRock also disclosed a strategic investment in Uniswap and bought an undisclosed amount of UNI, Uniswap’s governance token.
- UNI rose 25% on the news to $4.11, before later dropping back to $3.35. The move is described as the first direct investment by a major financial institution in a DeFi project’s governance token.
- BlackRock worked with Uniswap Labs and compliance firm Securitize. BUIDL trades will route through UniswapX, an offchain quote system that sources prices from approved market makers and settles trades onchain.
- Investors must be qualified through Securitize to ensure compliance with U.S. securities regulations.
