Crypto Majors Lose Ground as Nvidia Selloff Spreads Across Markets

Cryptocurrency markets remain under pressure, with gains becoming increasingly rare across the broader market. Over the past 24 hours, only five cryptocurrencies among the top 100 by market capitalization have advanced by at least 1%, highlighting the widespread weakness affecting digital assets.

Arbitrum (ARB), Render (RNDR), Pepe (PEPE), Quant (QNT) and GateToken (GT) were among the few tokens posting meaningful gains. Meanwhile, Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), XRP and Solana (SOL) all traded lower, reflecting continued selling pressure across major cryptocurrencies.

The downturn coincided with renewed weakness in technology stocks. Nvidia shares fell more than 4% in premarket trading as reports surrounding CEO Jensen Huang attracted fresh scrutiny. Huang has reportedly acknowledged an alleged relationship with a woman suspected of having links to Chinese intelligence, prompting Nvidia’s board to launch an independent investigation.

Derivatives Activity Signals Traders Are Cutting Exposure

Futures trading picks up sharply: Cryptocurrency futures volume jumped more than 200% to approximately $180 billion over the past 24 hours. However, the increase in trading activity came alongside a 3% decline in aggregate open interest to around $127 billion.

The combination suggests that traders were actively adjusting or closing existing positions rather than establishing substantial new exposure. Total liquidations reached approximately $1.1 billion, while the taker buy-sell ratio showed sellers accounting for 51.5% of market orders.

Bitcoin positioning remains relatively resilient: BTC futures open interest declined just 0.2%, even as Bitcoin’s price dropped 2.2%. This smaller contraction indicates that derivatives traders largely maintained their positions during the selloff.

Bitcoin liquidations totaled approximately $305 million. Funding rates remained above zero but weakened from Thursday’s levels, suggesting that bullish traders were still paying to maintain leveraged long positions, although their advantage had narrowed.

Ethereum sees a deeper reduction in open interest: ETH derivatives experienced a more pronounced adjustment. Open interest fell 6.7% as Ether’s price declined 5.9%, pointing to more aggressive position closures.

Liquidations involving ETH reached approximately $498 million, substantially exceeding Bitcoin’s $305 million despite Ethereum having a much smaller open-interest base.

Funding rates also moved into negative territory, reversing their previous positive reading. The shift indicates that short sellers are now paying long traders, reflecting increasingly bearish positioning in the Ethereum derivatives market.

ZEC and XRP traders reduce leverage: Zcash open interest dropped 9.7% while its price fell 4.5%. XRP recorded a 9.2% decline in open interest alongside a 6.5% price decrease.

The sharper reductions in open interest relative to price movements suggest that traders are withdrawing capital and closing leveraged positions in both assets.

Nvidia perpetual futures activity accelerates: Trading in Binance-listed NVDA perpetual contracts increased by more than 200%, pushing volume above $500 million. The surge followed reports concerning Huang and the company’s decision to investigate the allegations.

Options markets reflect growing downside concerns: Bitcoin’s one-week implied volatility increased to 43% from 33% on Thursday. Ethereum’s equivalent measure climbed to 60%, compared with 46% previously.

Options skew also moved higher for both assets. Bitcoin’s one-week skew rose from 2% to 13%, while Ethereum’s increased from 7% to 15%. The changes indicate that traders are paying more for downside protection as uncertainty grows.

Put demand strengthens in Bitcoin options: Four of Bitcoin’s six most actively traded options contracts were puts, with activity concentrated around strike prices of $70,000 to $72,000.

Ethereum options activity was more evenly distributed, with three calls and three puts among the six most traded contracts. The December $1,900 put emerged as the most actively traded ETH contract.

ETH and XRP Face Heavy Selling Pressure

Ethereum breaks below a key technical level: Ether dropped 5.9% to approximately $2,100, closing below its 200-day moving average for the first time since August 18.

The decline triggered substantial forced liquidations. ETH accounted for approximately $501 million of the $1.16 billion wiped out across cryptocurrency markets in the previous 24 hours, with long positions bearing most of the losses.

XRP declines alongside the broader market: XRP fell approximately 7.3%, extending its losses as investors reduced exposure to major alternative cryptocurrencies.

Payment tokens lead sector declines: Payment-related cryptocurrencies recorded an average decline of approximately 5%, making the category the weakest-performing sector during the latest downturn.

DeFi tokens lost around 3.5%, while memecoins declined 2.35%. Layer-2 assets performed relatively better, falling just 0.12%.

Arbitrum stands out among the few gainers: ARB advanced more than 5% despite the widespread market weakness. Increased on-chain activity related to real-world assets has helped support the token, making it one of the strongest performers among the largest cryptocurrencies.