Bitcoin Options Traders Load up on $120K Strike Through December 2026

CME‘s bitcoin options open interest, measured in dollar terms, has dropped from a peak near $290 million in late November to roughly $30 million to $40 million by mid June, according to Cryptoquant data. Put open interest still outweighs calls on most trading days, a pattern that has held since July 2025.

When CME’s options book is broken down by expiration, most contracts cluster in the one to two-month window. Longer dated positions, those expiring four months or more out, have thinned considerably since the fall, leaving traders concentrated in near term bets rather than spreading risk further into 2026 and beyond.

Futures Open Interest Tells a Different Story

Bitcoin futures open interest across exchanges paints a broader picture. Binance leads all venues with 131.97K BTC in open interest, worth $8.42 billion, good for an 18.22% share of the market, per Coinglass data. CME ranks second among the listed venues at 106.03K BTC, or $6.77 billion, holding a 14.64% share with a notably high open interest to volume ratio of 1.1547.

Gate and Bybit sit close together at roughly 60K BTC each. MEXC holds 71.30K BTC. Smaller venues like Bitget, BingX, and Bitunix round out the rankings, with BingX posting an 18.41% drop in open interest over 24 hours, the steepest decline among the major platforms tracked.

Exchange-wide BTC open interest in dollar terms has fallen from highs above $90 billion last October to a range closer to $60 billion to $70 billion now, tracking bitcoin’s retreat from levels above $120,000.

Calls Still Outnumber Puts on Deribit

On Deribit, the largest crypto options exchange, calls outweigh puts in total open interest, 303,642.92 BTC versus 215,446.49 BTC, a 58.50% to 41.50% split favoring upside bets. The picture flips in 24-hour volume, where puts edge out calls, 11,148.96 BTC to 10,504.94 BTC, suggesting short-term hedging activity even as longer-dated positioning leans bullish.

The most active strikes on Deribit include the Dec. 25, 2026 $120,000 call, holding 7,526.9 BTC in open interest, and the July 31, 2026 $80,000 call at 7,118.9 BTC. Traders are also building positions on the downside, with the Dec. 25, 2026 $60,000 put carrying 6,224.1 BTC.

Max Pain Levels Diverge by Exchange

Max pain, the strike price where the largest number of options contracts expire worthless, varies by venue but follows a similar arc. On Deribit, near term max pain sits around $63,000 for this week’s expiry, climbing toward $75,000 for contracts expiring in September and December 2026 before easing toward $72,000 by March 2027.

Binance shows a comparable pattern, with max pain near $66,700 for the closest expiry and a climb to $75,000 by the September and December 2026 dates, then a pullback to roughly $56,600 by late March 2027. OKX traces nearly identical territory, with max pain rising from about $69,000 to $72,000 by September and continuing upward toward $75,000 in the data’s furthest visible point.

What This Means for Traders

The gap between near term and longer-dated max pain levels signals that options writers expect bitcoin to trade higher over the next six to nine months, even as current open interest on regulated venues like CME has contracted sharply from last year’s highs.

Total bitcoin options open interest across all exchanges has fallen to roughly $35 billion, down from a peak above $65 billion in October, according to Coinglass figures. That decline tracks bitcoin’s broader price retreat from six figures, but the concentration of call open interest at strikes well above the current spot price suggests traders are positioning for a recovery rather than abandoning the market altogether.

For now, the options market is smaller than it was at bitcoin’s peak, but the strikes traders are choosing point toward expectations of higher prices later in 2026.