$5B Bitcoin Options Expiry: The Rocket Fuel Crypto Needs for a 2025 Surge?

Brace for impact—or ignition. As $5 billion in Bitcoin options hit expiry this week, traders are eyeing the charts like nervous astronauts counting down to launch.

Will this be the catalyst that sends crypto markets stratospheric? Or just another overhyped countdown fizzling out like a damp firework?

Here’s what the smart money’s watching:

The Gamma Squeeze Playbook

Market makers hedging their bets could trigger violent price swings—up or down. When this much notional value hits expiry, liquidity becomes thinner than a DeFi protocol’s security audit.

Max Pain vs. Max Gain

Options writers want prices pinned near $5B’s max pain point. But with open interest stacked like a Jenga tower, one whale move could send everything tumbling.

The Cynic’s Corner

Let’s be real—Wall Street’s ‘big boys’ will probably manipulate this expiry to shake out retail traders… just before riding the next pump. Some things never change.

Buckle up. This expiry won’t just move markets—it’ll test whether crypto’s 2025 rally has real thrust… or if we’re all just hodling bags of hopium.

Bitcoin Options Expiry

This week’s tranche of bitcoin options contracts has a put/call ratio of 0.90, meaning that there are almost as many long contracts expiring as shorts, and the bulls and bears are evenly matched.

Open interest (OI), or the value or number of BTC options contracts yet to expire, is highest at $140,000, which has surged to almost $3.2 billion at this strike price on Deribit. There is also around $2.4 billion OI at $120,000 strike price as the bull speculators load up on contracts and dwindling OI for lower strike prices.

Additionally, total Bitcoin futures OI currently stands at $83.3 billion, which is near record highs, according to CoinGlass.

Greeks Live, a crypto derivatives provider, said this week that the group was predominantly bullish, “with strong momentum in both BTC and ETH, with traders actively selling puts and holding long positions that are deeply in profit.”

“Key sentiment revolves around continued put selling strategies and excitement about ETH’s exceptional performance, though some concern exists about high volatility levels.”

Greeks added that trading volume shows the market’s enthusiasm for trading as Deribit traded $10.9 billion in options on Thursday, breaking the $10 billion mark for the first time in a single day.

As BTC hit a new all-time high and ETH neared its all-time high, the market experienced an unexpected correction, primarily triggered by an unexpectedly strong PPI reading.
There were no major changes in the options market, with no significant changes in the main term IV and… pic.twitter.com/sWWOp3KVXE

— Greeks.live (@GreeksLive) August 14, 2025

In addition to today’s batch of Bitcoin options, there are around 287,000 ethereum contracts that are also expiring, with a notional value of $1.3 billion, and a put/call ratio of 1.0. This brings Friday’s combined crypto options expiry notional value to around $6.1 billion.

Crypto Market Outlook

Total market capitalization hit an all-time high of $4.25 trillion this week, but it is still smaller than America’s largest corporation, Nvidia, and just 18% of gold’s total market cap of nearly $23 trillion.

However, markets had started to cool off by Friday, with total cap dropping 4% to $4.1 trillion at the time of writing.

Bitcoin led the losses, falling 3.8% to below $118,000, but managed to regain a little composure during the Friday morning Asian session as it nudged back toward $119,000.

Ethereum also cooled from recent four-year highs, sliding below $4,500 on Thursday before recovering to trade at $4,630 on Friday morning. Altcoins were also dumping hard despite increased calls for altseason … it’s not here yet!

A recognized pattern of Asia buying and the United States selling has started to FORM this week.