Bitcoin Holds Near $65,000 as Iran Pause Drags Oil Lower, Fed Decision Looms
Bitcoin was at $65,200, not much changed since midnight but about 1.6% better over 24 hours. It had poked up to $65,600 when Sunday futures
Monday opened on a better note than most of the past few weeks. Washington and Tehran agreed to pause strikes over the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend, and oil took the biggest hit. Brent fell hard, shedding more than 7% to land around $87 after trading above $100 for weeks. Stocks caught a lift and crypto found its footing.
Bitcoin was at $65,200, not much changed since midnight but about 1.6% better over 24 hours. It had poked up to $65,600 when Sunday futures opened before slipping back. Ether did better, tacking on 0.51% to reach $1,963. That puts it within striking distance of $2,000, a level it has not been near since early June. Wednesday’s Fed meeting is the next thing everyone’s watching. Inflation has been running at 4.1%, mostly because of what the oil surge did to prices during the Hormuz standoff. With crude now pulling back, the case for a rate hike has weakened a little. Markets put the odds of a move at 30.5% Monday morning, down from 37.4% when Friday’s session closed, per CME FedWatch.
In derivatives, bears paid the price for Sunday’s bounce. Short liquidations made up the bulk of Monday’s $312 million in forced closures. Futures open interest in bitcoin pulled back to 740,000 BTC after Friday’s spike above 760,000, suggesting futures traders are not fully chasing the move yet. Funding rates and cumulative volume delta both stayed positive though, which at least points to a mild bullish lean in positioning.
Ether’s derivatives looked stronger. Open interest in ETH futures climbed to 14.66 million, the highest since June 7, and ether’s 24-hour OI-adjusted cumulative volume delta was the most positive among major crypto assets. That tends to suggest buyers are actively driving price through market orders rather than waiting on the sidelines.
DeFi tokens had the best Monday across the board. AAVE jumped 9%, Lido’s LDO rose 9.4%, and ONDO added 7%. PUMP kept going, adding another 12% to push its market cap close to $800 million. Two weeks ago it was at $570 million. Zcash and Monero each gave back between 1.2% and 1.95%, handing back a slice of what they had built up recently.
The Altcoin Season Index moved up to 55 out of 100 and the average RSI across major altcoins came in at 51.88. Neither number is screaming bull market, but both are heading in the right direction after weeks of grinding lower.
Bitcoin’s implied volatility for the next 30 days parked itself near 40%, sitting just above the two-month low it touched recently. That’s a market that’s stopped panicking, which is different from a market that’s confident. Ether’s vol picture read about the same.
Whether any of this holds past Wednesday depends almost entirely on what the Fed decides and whether the Hormuz pause holds long enough to keep oil from bouncing back.
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