Open Interest in ETH Futures on Binance Halved in Dollars

The open interest in ETH futures on Binance has halved in dollar terms since the summer of 2025, while in terms of coins, it has remained almost unchanged. For investors, this means that leveraged trades are still prevalent in the market.

CryptoQuant analyst BaykusCharts sees both advantages and risks. Neither buyers nor sellers have a clear advantage, so the risk of a sudden wave of liquidations is limited. However, a large volume of open positions can accelerate movement in either direction if the price decisively breaks out of the range. According to him, dollar indicators can be misleading during significant price fluctuations.

Currently, the open interest in ETH on Binance is about $5.8 billion, while in the summer of 2025, the peak exceeded $12 billion. However, open interest is calculated in dollars, and the price of ETH has also fallen by about half. In terms of coins, contracts were worth about $12.3 billion at the peak with ETH at $4,700–4,800, and now it's $5.8 billion with the rate around $2,300. The volume in both cases is approximately 2.5 million ETH: the indicator has decreased due to the cheaper coin, not because of the closure of leveraged trades.

Funding rates – payments between buyers and sellers of perpetual futures – do not show sharp spikes as in 2021 and early 2024. Values remain slightly above zero after several negative periods this year. Neither side of the market is overloaded, and buyers are not overpaying to hold positions.

BaykusCharts advises monitoring two signals: a price increase with a sharp rise in the funding rate indicates buyer overheating, while a price drop with rising open interest suggests that sellers are increasing their bets on a decline.

Previously, trader Ansem changed his forecast for BTC and ETH to bearish, warning of the risk of falling below $82,000 and $2,400. According to BaykusCharts' logic, a large volume of positions in ETH in such a scenario could amplify the decline. Analysts at ARK Invest calculated that Robinhood Chain's revenue from fees for the first quarter of operation amounted to $51 million – $10 million more than Ethereum; some traders have moved to new platforms.