Week of 2 December 2024: BTC gains 4.04% and ETH 8.0%, with a wide Thursday swing
When both assets close near the top of a wide weekly range after a single volatile day, what does that say about the strength of the move and about the risk of holding leveraged positions through days like it?
BTC rose from 97,185.17 to 101,109.59 (+4.04%), ETH from 3,707.61 to 4,004.15 (+8.0%). Both closed in the upper third of their weekly ranges, 2.32% and 1.56% below their 52-week highs. Volume ran 1.79x and 2.22x the prior twelve-week averages, and hourly correlation was 0.68, a loose reading.
What the data shows. BTC opened at 97,185.17 and closed at 101,109.59, a 4.04% gain that ranks at the 68th percentile of the 355 weeks of history. Its week was not a straight line: on Thursday 5 December BTC set its high of 104,088 at 03:00 UTC and its low of 90,500 at 22:00 UTC, a 15.01% range within one day, and Thursday was also the week's worst day (-1.67%). The largest hourly move, +3.13%, came in the hour starting 02:00 UTC the same morning. ETH gained 8.0%, reaching its high of 4,087.73 late on Friday 6 December after its low of 3,500 on Tuesday 3 December. Both closes sat in the upper third of the week's range. Dollar volume was 1.79 times the prior twelve-week average for BTC and 2.22 times for ETH. The four prior weeks were mixed but mostly up for both assets.
What it does not show. Prices record the path, not the reason. Thursday's swing tells us how far and how fast the market moved, not what produced the reversal from 104,088 to 90,500 or who was on each side. Funding tells us longs paid shorts on average, but not how large those positions were; the data has no open-interest figures, so crowding cannot be sized here.
What a careful desk would check. Realised volatility, the size of the swings that actually happened scaled to a yearly figure, was 59.2% for BTC and 64.2% for ETH. A 15.01% intra-day range means stop distances calibrated on calmer weeks could be filled far from where intended. A desk would ask whether its exits and margin buffers survive a Thursday-sized reversal, and whether funding of 0.0229% per eight hours (peak 0.0724%) is counted in expected returns on a leveraged long.
Ether against Bitcoin. The two moved in the same direction but loosely, with hourly correlation at 0.68, below the 0.7 threshold that would count as tight. ETH outperformed by 3.96 percentage points and the ETH/BTC ratio rose 3.81%, so this was not a single broad trade lifting both equally.
What would change this reading
- If a later week closes below BTC's 90,500 low, Thursday 5 December reads as the start of a wider range rather than a one-day shakeout.
- If BTC holds above its weekly open of 97,185.17 while volume falls back towards its prior twelve-week average, the move looks absorbed rather than still building.
- If ETH's outperformance fades and the ETH/BTC ratio gives back the 3.81% gain, the loose correlation of this week was a temporary divergence, not a new relationship.
- If funding rises well above the 0.0229% eight-hour average while prices stall 2.32% and 1.56% below their 52-week highs, longs are paying more for a position that is no longer advancing.
Terms
- realised volatility
- how much the price actually swung over a period, expressed as a yearly percentage
- funding rate
- the periodic payment between long and short holders of a perpetual futures contract; positive means longs pay shorts
- hourly correlation
- how closely two prices moved together hour by hour, from -1 to 1; below 0.7 counts as loose