Crypto Markets Today: Bitcoin advances to $89,000 while gold tokens steal the spotlight

Gold’s rally to new record highs is lifting tokenized versions of the metal, highlighting investors’ continued focus on hedging risk rather than chasing higher-beta crypto assets.

Tether Gold (XAUT), the largest gold-backed token by market capitalization, climbed to a fresh all-time high of $4,425. Pax Gold (PAXG) and Kinesis Gold (KAU) also advanced, pushing the combined market value of gold-backed tokens to around $4.38 billion.

“The signal is clear: investors remain focused on hedging macro uncertainty instead of leaning aggressively into risk,” said Timothy Misir, head of research at BRN, in an email. “That divergence continues to limit broader crypto upside, even as liquidity conditions improve.”

Bitcoin — often referred to by supporters as digital gold — rose to about $89,800 as the U.S. dollar weakened and gains in technology shares lifted Asian equity markets. Heavyweight chipmakers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing and Samsung Electronics led advances, helping ease concerns about an overheated artificial intelligence trade. S&P 500 futures rose roughly 0.3%, pointing to a positive U.S. open.

Despite the price gains, signs of a durable crypto recovery remain limited as institutional interest appears to have cooled. Digital asset investment products recorded net outflows of $952 million last week — the first weekly outflow in four weeks — according to CoinShares.

Derivatives check

Stabilizing spot prices have yet to translate into renewed risk-taking across derivatives markets. Futures positioning remains mixed, with bitcoin, ether, HYPE and BNB seeing modest increases in open interest over the past 24 hours, while several other major tokens posted outflows.

Leveraged bitcoin long positions continue to build on Bitfinex, a pattern historically associated with extended bearish phases. Meanwhile, BTC’s 30-day implied volatility remains near 45%, signaling subdued trading conditions as the year draws to a close. Ether’s 30-day implied volatility slid to 70%, its lowest level since Oct. 9.

On the CME, open interest in bitcoin futures slipped below 120,000 BTC for the first time since early 2024, suggesting declining institutional participation. In perpetual futures markets, BCH, SHIB, WLFI and TON are showing negative funding rates, pointing to a bias toward short positions, while funding for major tokens remains modestly positive.

Options activity on Deribit remains mixed. Block trades included both bitcoin call and put spreads, while ether traders focused on calendar spreads. Overall, BTC and ETH puts continue to trade at a premium to calls, though the downside bias has eased slightly since Friday.

Token talk

Curve DAO has rejected a proposal to allocate 17.45 million CRV tokens — worth roughly $6.3 million — to Swiss Stake AG, a company led by Curve Finance founder Michael Egorov that oversees core protocol development.

The proposal, which sought funding for infrastructure, security and development work for Swiss Stake’s 25-person team, failed with 54.46% of votes against and 45.54% in favor. On-chain data show wallets linked to Yearn Finance and Convex Finance accounted for nearly 90% of the opposing votes.

Despite the rejection, CRV rose around 4% over the past 24 hours, outperforming the broader crypto market. Over the same period, the CoinDesk 20 index gained 0.35%.

Some DAO members raised concerns about transparency, particularly around reporting of previous spending. “The DAO deserves a detailed and transparent breakdown of expenses and should not approve further funding until that standard is met,” one member wrote.