Our weekly crypto derivatives analytics report delves into macro events, the current state of crypto and trading signals from spot trading volume, and futures, options and perpetual contracts.

December's end-of-year options expiration brought an unexpected drop as realized volatility fell to the lowest levels of the month. Perpetual swap open interest remained stable, indicating these markets weren't heavily used for hedging against expired options, likely contributing to the muted volatility. 

While most expired open interest in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) hasn't been reinvested, the balance of calls and puts remains consistent. Notably, ETH options are pricing in higher implied volatility as compared to BTC, particularly for shorter expirations, leading to a flat term structure for ETH, while BTC is offering cheaper options exposure.

In the perpetual markets, low volatility and minimal spot movements have led funding rates for nearly all tokens to mirror broader market sentiment throughout the holiday season. On the options side, BTC's term structure is noticeably lower and steeper than ETH's, with realized volatility now dipping below implied volatility levels, highlighting an intriguing shift in market dynamics.

Please check out the report’s highlights.

Open Interest Solid Amid Year-End Options Expiration

Although open interest for both BTC and ETH perpetual swaps hasn’t returned to early December 2024 highs, it remained robust throughout the significant end-of-year options expiration event. This suggests that these markets weren’t heavily utilized to 

 of the expiring options contracts, likely contributing to the lack of volatility observed during this period. Instead, trading volumes have dipped noticeably during the winter holiday season, coinciding with a collapse in realized volatility back to December 2024’s lowest levels.

BTC Option Curve Remains Steep During Call-Put Parity

The expiration of December's end-of-year options didn’t trigger the anticipated surge in volatility; instead, realized volatility has plummeted to the lower end of its recent range. The implied volatility term structure remains steep compared to both its recent behavior and ETH's, with longer-dated implied volatility around 57%, and 1-week at-the-money options trading about five points lower. Much of the expired open interest hasn’t yet been rolled into new positions, maintaining a neutral balance between puts and calls. Consequently, BTC's options market positioning is relatively neutral, lacking the leverage it had at the start of December 2024.

Huge ETH Option Expiring Doesn’t Cause Volatility

A late December spike in realized volatility didn’t carry into the new year, with ETH’s spot price currently exhibiting volatility below that of short-tenor implied volatility. Interestingly, the implied volatility term structure has undergone a steepening and re-flattening over the past week, contrasting with BTC’s slightly steeper profile. This suggests that ETH’s options market is anticipating higher short-term volatility in spot price movements. 

Despite the significant expiration of options open interest at the end of December 2024, which didn’t lead to a rollover into later expirations, call options continue to dominate the market and have increased at the start of 2025.

Advanced

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Bybit X Block Scholes Crypto Derivatives Analytics Report (Jan 2, 2025): BTC Options Continue to See Call-Put Parity, With Lower Short-Term Volatility Expected

Dive into FLock, a decentralized platform that revolutionizes the way AI models are developed, trained and deployed.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to transform countless industries, but its development often raises questions about privacy, control and inclusivity. 

 is a unique decentralized platform that democratizes AI training, fine-tuning and inferencing. With its blockchain-powered infrastructure, FLock ensures transparency, security and community-driven decision-making, paving the way for AI models that align with established societal values. 

In this article, we’ll explore how FLock decentralizes AI training, its key features and its potential impact on developers, communities and users.

 platform that revolutionizes the way AI models are developed, trained and deployed. By leveraging blockchain technology and a novel approach called 

, FLock addresses critical issues in AI development, such as centralized control, lack of transparency and privacy concerns.

At its core, FLock’s mission is to democratize AI by enabling communities to participate directly in the creation and refinement of AI models. Through federated learning, FLock trains AI models across multiple decentralized devices or servers. This method ensures that data remains local, eliminating the need for raw data exchange while still enabling robust model training. By decentralizing the training process, FLock not only protects individual privacy, but also fosters a more inclusive ecosystem in which diverse contributors can collaborate.

What sets FLock apart is its integration of 

. This ensures that all contributions — whether data, compute power or feedback — are transparently recorded and fairly rewarded. Blockchain tech’s immutable ledger enhances trust among participants and safeguards the process against manipulation. Additionally, the platform’s on-chain incentive mechanisms encourage participation from a wide range of contributors, ensuring that rewards are distributed equitably.

Ultimately, FLock empowers communities to develop bespoke AI models tailored to their specific needs. By decentralizing the process and prioritizing transparency and collaboration, FLock breaks the monopoly of large corporations, creating an AI ecosystem that aligns with public ethics and societal values.

, an Oxford alumnus with a robust background in AI and blockchain technology. Sun, who serves as FLock's CEO, has an impressive career trajectory, having worked as the Director of AI for the Royal Bank of Canada and as an AI Research Fellow at Imperial College London. His vision for FLock stems from a deep understanding of both the technical and ethical challenges of AI development.

The founding team also includes other Oxford alumni, boasting over a decade of combined experience in AI research and the cryptocurrency industry. This team brings a collective blend of academic excellence and practical expertise that positions FLock to lead the decentralized AI movement.

FLock has successfully raised $11 million in funding across two rounds, reflecting strong investor confidence in its vision. In May 2024, FLock secured a $6 million seed round co-led by Lightspeed Faction and Tagus Capital, with additional backing from Digital Currency Group (DCG), Volt Capital, OKX Ventures and Inception Capital.

Later, in December 2024, FLock announced a $3 million successful funding round led by DCG and joined by prominent names like Animoca Brands, Fenbushi Capital, GnosisVC and GSR. These investments are being channelled into enhancing the platform’s testnet and federated learning client, accelerating FLock’s mission of enabling secure, collaborative AI development.

With this funding and over 1,500 nodes contributing from platforms like Numerai and Kaggle, FLock is rapidly scaling its impact on decentralized AI training.

FLock AI revolutionizes AI development through its decentralized training framework. This approach allows participants to contribute to AI model training without ever sharing their personal data. Instead, models are trained locally across devices using federated learning, which ensures that data remains with its owners while still enhancing the accuracy of the model overall. 

FLock’s reward system is designed to incentivize active participation. Contributors who provide data, computational power and/or feedback are compensated with FLOCK tokens, ensuring a fair distribution of rewards. 

FLock empowers its community through a robust governance framework. Decisions regarding AI model development, deployment and ethical considerations are driven by the community, ensuring alignment with established societal values. Through blockchain-based voting mechanisms, contributors can influence the direction of AI projects, fostering transparency and public accountability. 

FLock’s modular architecture allows contributors to participate in specific aspects of AI model development. Whether providing raw data or computational power or even refining algorithms, the platform enables a collaborative and scalable development process. 

At the core of FLock’s philosophy is its commitment to privacy and security. By leveraging blockchain technology, the platform ensures that no single entity controls the AI development process. Data remains local and protected by cryptographic measures, while the immutability of blockchain guarantees transparency in every transaction and model update. 

 begins with a blockchain and an AI layer.

The blockchain layer underpins FLock’s incentivization and security mechanisms.

The AI layer facilitates model training, refinement and deployment, leveraging both centralized and federated approaches.

Let’s have a look at the supply and demand for the FLOCK token.

FLock adopts a 1:2 ratio model between team/investors (33.3%) and community (66.7%), prioritizing community-driven growth and ecosystem expansion. The majority of tokens are allocated to incentivize user participation and long-term ecosystem success.

FLock aims to improve the future of AI development by decentralizing the training process and ensuring transparency, privacy and inclusivity. By leveraging blockchain and federated learning, FLock empowers communities to contribute to AI creation without compromising on privacy. Its innovative reward system and community-driven governance foster a fair and collaborative ecosystem. 

With significant backing and a growing network of contributors, FLock is positioning itself as a leader in decentralized AI, offering a more ethical and secure alternative to traditional AI development models. As it continues to scale, FLock is set to transform the way AI models are built and deployed.

 — and earn a share of a 10 million FLOCK prize pool. For more details, visit 

Intermediate

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FLock AI: Decentralized AI Training

In this tutorial, we’ll explore how you can complete a series of tasks in Network3 for Bybit Web3 Airdrop Arcade.

Task 1: Register for a Network3 Account and Connect Your Bybit Wallet 

: Navigate to the campaign page and click on the 

task. Click on the task, and Galxe will ask to redirect you to the Network3 register page.

: Register for a Network3 account using your email address. You may indicate a 

Task 2: Download the Network3 App and Run a Node for One Hour

 and choose your operating system to download the Network3 app.

 or powerbutton, depending upon which operating system you’re using. For ease of reference, we’ve used macOS and iOS as examples below.

: Keep running the node until the timer reaches 

Beginner

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How to Complete Network3 Tasks for Bybit Web3 Airdrop Arcade

Bybit launched the Bybit Merch Creative Challenge for university students worldwide, offering a $50,000 USDT prize pool.

The S&P 500 dropped 0.22% on Thursday, its fifth straight decline, with investors eyeing Friday’s economic updates. Coindesk Indices, an index measuring broader cryptocurrency market performance was up by 2.03%, with Bitcoin and Ether rising by 2.79% and 2.70%, respectively in the past 24 hours.

Today's top performer is XRP, which surged 1.9% following a rise in price driven by increased open interest and positive market sentiment.

Ripple (XRP), launched in August 2012, is a blockchain technology company focused on improving international payments with its cryptocurrency, XRP. XRP price surged due to increased open interest, a major XRP transfer, and market sentiment linked to Trump's inauguration. Bullish momentum is supported by high short liquidations, with key resistance levels to watch for further price movement.

Check Out the Latest Prices, Charts, and Data of 

 for university students worldwide, offering a $50,000 USDT prize pool. Participants can design exclusive Bybit merchandise, with submissions open until Jan. 15, 2025. Winners will be announced on Feb. 1, 2025, across four prize categories.

Yesterday, Bitcoin Spot ETFs recorded a total inflow of $84.8M, driven by $107.9M from non-GBTC funds, partially offset by a $23.1M outflow from GBTC.

, offering an airdrop for participants who complete tasks like swapping and bridging using the Mango wallet. Points earned through tasks determine airdrop rewards. Join via the Mango wallet and follow steps on the testnet dashboard.

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Bybit Launches $50,000 Merch Design Challenge for University Students Worldwide

Blockchain

GameFi

Altcoins

Neoxa is a blockchain that employs both proof of work (PoW) and proof of gaming (PoG) consensus. It uses KAWPOW mining algorithm that favors GPU miners, making it easy for gamers to mine.

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have inundated the crypto industry. While they can come with promises of big earnings through gaming, P2E NFT games have a fundamental challenge: In-game NFTs face the possibility of depreciation in value, which effectively reduces your earnings — especially if you’d bought the NFT at a higher price at the game’s launch. This makes most P2E games unsustainable over the long run.

Neoxa avoids the typical P2E NFT game hype. Instead, it chooses to combine mining and gaming so you can earn cryptocurrency in a different way. Let’s explore this blockchain’s special features and the various ways you can mine its coin, NEOX.

Neoxa is a new blockchain that launched its mainnet on May 19, 2022. It employs both 

 (PoW) and proof of gaming (PoG) consensus.

 mining algorithm, which favors GPU over ASIC, making it easy for gamers to mine. 

The Neoxa network’s block time is 60 seconds. For each block mined, 5,000 NEOX tokens are released. Rewards are halved after every four years, similar to Bitcoin and Ravencoin’s protocols. In the first year, 85% of the rewards are given to PoW miners and 10% are given to PoG miners, with 5% allocated to the developer fund.

What’s unique about Neoxa is that instead of creating its own blockchain game from scratch, it’s paired with existing games that already have an abundance of players. This frees it from an ongoing criticism that many P2E game creators face — that they produce tedious games which seem more like a chore than actual entertainment.

 of the Neoxa blockchain. You earn NEOX either through mining via the PoW algorithm, or as a reward for completing specific activities in popular video games such as 

As shown on the Neoxa price chart below, the current price of the Neoxa coin (as of Oct. 4, 2022) is hovering around $0.002, with a current 

 of over $2 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $352,553. Its max and total supply are set at 21 billion NEOX, with a circulating supply of approximately 981 million NEOX.

The highest price (ATH) ever recorded for NEOX was $0.025 on September 4, 2022, and its ATL was $0.0013 on August 24, 2022. 

Since the coin is in its infancy, it's listed on only a few cryptocurrency exchanges. You can buy NEOX from 

You can mine Neoxa Coin on Windows and Hive OS, and while playing 

. Before you can mine NEOX and earn rewards, you’ll need to 

. You need to install it and set it up after downloading. 

Now that you have your wallet set up, let’s get to the three ways to mine NEOX. 

To mine on Windows, you’ll need a mining pool and mining software, in addition to your wallet.

While you can do solo mining, it’s not an easy feat for beginners. Therefore, we recommend you start with pool mining. There are many 

 to choose from, with some pools offering both pool mining and solo mining options.

 you can download for the KawPoW algorithm that Neoxa uses, which is the same as Ravencoin’s. Thus, if you mine Ravencoin, you can use the same miners to mine Neoxa. For NVIDIA GPUs, T-Rex Miner or GMiner are the best to use. For AMD GPUs, go for TeamRedMiner or NBMiner.

Once you’ve chosen your mining pool and miner, it’s time to configure them.

You’ll first need to extract the miner after downloading it, since Windows will block the miner, and then add an exception to the firewall. Next, 

. Copy the command line given and save the file, making sure that the file extension is .bat. Finally, open the .bat file to start mining NEOX.

Mining NEOX on Hive OS is similar to mining with most other cryptocurrencies. Here are the steps for mining NEOX on Hive OS: 

Here’s the feature that makes the Neoxa blockchain so unique. You can earn rewards simply by completing tasks while playing games. Completing these tasks is equal to mining on a proof-of-game blockchain. 

, then add your wallet address. This way, your rewards will automatically be transferred to your wallet. 

As of the time of writing this article (Oct. 4, 2022), you can only mine Neoxa on 

 (Neoxa Proof of Game Minecraft) server. The developers will soon add various games, such as 

Some of the in-game events that can earn you NEOX in 

 include ore pickup, structure repair and wood pickup.

The Neoxa blockchain achieves two objectives at once by bringing together gaming communities and crypto miners, which is no small feat. 

The potential use cases of the Neoxa token in the future are tantalizing, as it will offer significant revenue opportunities for investors, game developers and players. 

The fact that NEOX got listed on multiple exchanges so quickly is also an encouraging factor that’s made experts bullish about its future. 

 by 2025 — which is a big jump from its current price of $0.002. 

 both expect a much slower rise in NEOX price, sharing similar predictions that NEOX will only be worth around $0.01 in 2025. 

These prognostications, however, are not financial advice. Always do 

to decide whether any investment is good choice for you, particularly with a project as new as Neoxa.

Neoxa effectively connects the gaming and crypto worlds, bridging the gap between these communities with innovative blockchain technology that leverages existing fun games — so that gamers can have fun while earning money.

With its potential and its quick gain in traction, we recommend keeping a close eye on Neoxa’s new game servers, updates and other features so you don’t miss a good investment window should it arise.

Neoxa Coin (NEOX): Mine And Earn Through Gaming

Grab Up to 5,000 USDT in Rewards

Grab Up to 5,000 USDT in Rewards