The largest single-day options expiry in recent months is clearing today, and the market is already pricing in the friction. Bitcoin price sits at $63,800, hovering just below the $64,000 max pain level as dealers manage delta exposure into settlement in its current bullish prediction. Ethereum trades around $1,890, staying near its own max pain threshold with conviction still absent on both sides.

According to data reported on July 31, 149,000 BTC options expired with a put/call ratio of 0.28, max pain at $64,000, and a notional value of $9.6 billion. Meanwhile, 435,000 ETH options expired with a put/call ratio of 0.63, max pain at $1,850, and a notional value of $830 million. Together, more than $10.4 billion in crypto options were cleared during a single session.

The BTC put/call ratio of 0.28 remains heavily skewed toward calls. That reflects bullish positioning, although many upside bets still expired out of the money. As the expiry passes, attention shifts to whether fresh positioning replaces those contracts or traders remain cautious.

Next comes dealer rehedging and a reset in open interest. That can spark a fresh directional move or leave prices drifting in thin liquidity. Meanwhile, the previous FOMC session offered little clarity, and the macro backdrop still lacks a strong catalyst for crypto.

Catch Bitcoin and Ethereum’s Volatility on Bybit and Get a Chance to Win Our $1,000 USDT Airdrop

Bitcoin Price Prediction: Reclaim $66,000 After Today’s $9.6 Billion Expiry Clears?

Bitcoin trades at $63,800, remaining pinned near the $64,000 max pain level. That is less coincidence than options market mechanics. With a 0.28 put/call ratio, the market leaned heavily toward calls, making $64,000 the level where the greatest number of contracts expired with minimal payouts. Once the settlement clears, that influence fades.

Immediate resistance sits between $65,500 and $66,000. A decisive break could open the way toward $68,000, although stronger volume must confirm the move. Meanwhile, ETF flows have remained soft this week, and US equity volatility has yet to pull fresh capital into crypto. That divergence continues to limit bullish momentum.

Bitcoin (BTC)

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The bullish case sees post-expiry dealer hedging unwind, allowing Bitcoin to reclaim $66,000 and challenge $68,000 to $70,000 over the coming sessions. The base case keeps price ranging between $62,000 and $66,000 as traders wait for a fresh catalyst. A daily close below $62,000 would put $60,000 support back into focus.

Ethereum trades around $1,891, leaving the $1,900 level as an important resistance zone. Its max pain level sits at $1,850, placing the price only modestly above that mark after expiry. A sustained move above $2,000 would improve Ethereum’s technical structure and strengthen the near term outlook.

Discover: The Best Token Presales

Bitcoin Hyper Targets Early Mover Upside as Bitcoin Tests Post-Expiry Footing

BTC at $63,800 with an 8-month bear market still unresolved presents a clear asymmetry problem: the upside to $70,000 from here is roughly 9.5%, but the downside to $60,000 is equally accessible and better supported by current macro conditions. Rotation into early-stage Bitcoin infrastructure with a different risk profile is exactly the trade that gains attention in these sideways regimes.

Bitcoin Hyper ($HYPER) is positioned as the first Bitcoin Layer 2 with Solana Virtual Machine (SVM) integration, meaning it targets sub-second finality and low-cost smart contract execution directly within the Bitcoin ecosystem, without sacrificing BTC’s base-layer security.

That’s a technically distinct proposition from existing L2 approaches, as presale has raised $32.9 million at a current price of $0.0136839, with staking available for holders during the raise period. The project includes a Decentralized Canonical Bridge for native BTC transfers and high-speed transaction execution that reportedly outperforms Solana itself on latency benchmarks.

Post-expiry BTC could grind sideways for sessions before resolving, the risk/reward math on early infrastructure plays looks different than chasing spot at current levels.

Research Bitcoin Hyper before the next presale stage closes.

Discover: The Best Crypto to Diversify Your Portfolio

The post Bitcoin Price Prediction: $10 Billion of BTC and ETH Option Expiry Hitting the Market Today appeared first on Cryptonews.

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In the latest XRP News, XRP price is trading at $1.07, down 0.57% in the last 24 hours, as the asset continues to wrestle with the $1.10 resistance that has capped three consecutive sessions of attempted recovery.

The setup looks deceptively calm on the surface, but the macro and on-chain picture underneath tells a more complicated story. Whether this range resolves with a clean break or a reversal depends on factors that are moving fast right now.

The Federal Reserve held rates steady in the 3.50%–3.75% range, but Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish post-meeting tone, insisting the Fed “will deliver the 2% target”, reinforced a risk-off undertone across liquid assets.

Despite that headwind, on-chain data from Santiment shows mid-tier holders (10,000–100,000 XRP) lifting their cumulative share to 11.9% of total supply, up from 11.64% on July 1, while the 100,000–1M XRP cohort climbed to 11.75% over the same window.

Ripple also secured full MiCA Crypto-Asset Service Provider authorization in Europe this week, a regulatory milestone with direct implications for institutional XRP payments flowing across the EU. Perpetual futures open interest sits at 2.27 billion XRP, just below this week’s peak of 2.29 billion.

The combination of a hawkish Fed, a technically capped chart, and a meaningful regulatory unlock creates a binary setup worth examining closely.

Xrp (XRP)

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Discover: What traders are pricing for the Fed’s next move on Kalshi

XRP News: Can XRP Price Break $1.10 Resistance This Week?

XRP is trading at $1.07, pinned below the Bollinger Band midline near $1.10 and every key exponential moving average.

The 50-day EMA at $1.13 converges with the upper Bollinger Band around $1.14, creating a dense overhead zone that has rejected every intraday push so far. The 100-day EMA at $1.21 and the 200-day EMA at $1.41 confirm the broader structural trend still leans lower. Those levels are not in play unless near-term momentum shifts materially.

Momentum reads soft. Daily RSI hovers near 45, technically neutral but drifting toward weak. MACD is fractionally negative, signaling fading bullish attempts rather than any fresh accumulation pulse. Trading volume and open interest below this week’s high both undermine the idea that a breakout is imminent.

$1.00 remains the primary support level traders are watching. A close below it invalidates the current recovery thesis outright.

MiCA follow-through driving institutional flow, open interest expanding above 2.29 billion, and XRP clearing $1.10 with volume opens a run toward $1.13 to $1.14.

Range-bound consolidation between $1.05 and $1.15 continues while the market waits on ETF flow headlines and any exchange listing catalysts, the more likely near-term path. A daily close below $1.00 signals distribution is winning and the mid-tier accumulation data becomes irrelevant.

Discover: Live odds on the Fed’s next rate decision

The post Ripple Just Got Full MiCA Authorization in Europe But Fed’s Hawkish Tone Is Keeping XRP Capped at $1.10 appeared first on Cryptonews.

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The latest earnings week has handed investors a clear shortlist of US stocks to watch in August. Three of the market’s largest companies just reported, and Wall Street split its verdict between reward and punishment.

The divide came down to one test, which AI spender could prove that customers are paying for the build. It left the winners with strong setups and one laggard facing a cautious road into August.

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)

Microsoft soared about 15% to near $451 after its July 29 results, its biggest jump in months. Trading volume, the number of shares changing hands, hit its highest since June 22, which shows strong conviction behind the buying.

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Yet the rally is not fully convincing. That volume still sits below the heavy selling of late June, so buyers have not fully overpowered sellers.

The Chaikin Money Flow (CMF), a gauge of whether institutional money is flowing into or out of a stock, shows the same doubt. It nearly turned negative before earnings, then rose to 0.04 as big investors reacted. It still sits below its July 24 peak, and it must reclaim that level to confirm institutions are truly buying.

The fundamentals explain the jump. Microsoft spent $41 billion on capital expenditure, the cost of building AI data centers, but backed it with a $678 billion book of signed customer contracts. That locked-in demand proves the spending is funded by real orders, which is the bullish case. It also guided Azure cloud growth toward 45%, and faster growth at that scale points to rising future revenue.

Wall Street agrees. The stock holds a Strong Buy rating, with 24 of 25 firms on Buy, signaling broad expectations of more upside.

Only Barclays trimmed its target, a lone caution that matches the soft volume.

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN)

Amazon carries the strongest analyst support of the three, making it one of the more bullish US stocks to watch into August. All 28 covering firms rate it Buy, with none on Hold or Sell, and every major desk raised its price target after earnings. That rare unanimity gives Amazon the cleanest bull case of the week.

Options positioning backs that optimism. The put-to-call volume ratio, which compares bearish bets against bullish ones, fell from 0.74 to 0.54 into the print, meaning traders bought far more calls and leaned bullish.

The open interest ratio, the standing option contracts already in place, held steady at 0.66. That shows longer-term money has not fully committed yet, which leaves room for new buyers to lift the stock in August.

The business explains the confidence. Amazon Web Services, its cloud arm, reaccelerated, and the company disclosed a $496 billion backlog of signed customer demand. When Alphabet and Meta raised their AI spending, investors sold both stocks, fearing spending with no proven payoff. Amazon raised spending too, but its backlog proved customers had already agreed to pay, so the stock rose instead.

There is a catch worth knowing. Amazon’s headline $5.75 per share reads like a huge beat, but most of it came from a one-time paper gain on its Anthropic stake, not from the core business. Strip that out, and profit still rose a healthy 43%, so the bull case holds. The real pressure is cash, because heavy AI spending has pushed free cash flow, the money a company keeps after building, into the red over the past year.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META)

Meta is the outlier among the top US stocks to watch. The stock fell about 8% to near $539 and now sits roughly 23% below its mid-July high.

The problem is cash, not sales. Revenue grew 28%, but free cash flow collapsed to $784 million from $8.55 billion a year earlier. Capex nearly swallowed all the cash the business generated, so Meta leaned on about $25 billion of new debt to keep funding its dividend, which unsettles investors.

Unlike Microsoft and Amazon, the other two US stocks to watch, Meta disclosed no backlog of signed demand, so it cannot yet prove the AI build will pay off. Its core apps also earned less, as Family of Apps operating income, the profit from Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, slipped to $23.4 billion from $25 billion. The strongest ad engine on earth delivered a weaker bottom line.

The chart warns of more risk. Meta’s CMF trended lower even as the price climbed from early June to mid-July, and a deep correction followed. It still has not cleared the 0.05 line that would confirm buyers are back, so the same bearish drop could repeat.

Analysts stay loyal but nervous. Meta keeps a Strong Buy, yet at least ten firms cut price targets overnight, including Citi to $800 from $850.

That lower ceiling with unchanged ratings signals near-term caution even from believers.

The post 3 US Stocks To Watch In August 2026 After Big Earnings Week appeared first on BeInCrypto.

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Fundstrat’s Tom Lee says the artificial intelligence (AI) trade is not finished. He argues the next leg runs through crypto payment rails built for software agents rather than people.

Veteran macro investor Jordi Visser argued the opposite this week. Lee also chairs the largest corporate holder of ether, which gives his version of the thesis a direct financial stake.

Why Lee Says Chips Were Only the First Leg

Lee, co-founder and head of research at Fundstrat, made the case on a panel hosted by the firm. He covered mobile phones as an analyst in the early 1990s.

Motorola and the infrastructure suppliers led that cycle early. The larger winners arrived later, namely the tower companies spun out of the carriers, and Apple.

Lee expects the same shape now, with financial services as the downstream market. He has already called AI capital spending fears a bullish market tell.

The Four Reasons Banks Cannot Bank Agents

Lee listed trust, proof of funds, lending, and tax collection as the reasons people built commerce around banks. Agents need none of those, he argued.

“It’s a mistake to think that this is going to be built on traditional financial rails,” Lee said.

Bank ledgers must settle in a single national currency. Money is becoming code, according to Lee, so equities, gold, and tokens could all clear as payment.

Part of that rail already exists on paper. ERC-8183, a proposed Ethereum standard filed on Feb. 25, locks an agent’s payment in escrow until a designated evaluator signs off.

Ethereum Foundation researcher Davide Crapis co-authored it with three Virtuals Protocol engineers. It carries Draft status, so nothing about it is final.

Where Tom Lee and Visser Split on the AI Trade

Visser leads AI research at 22V Research and spent two decades at Weiss Multi-Strategy Advisers, latterly as chief investment officer. He says AI’s easy money is over.

He now expects roughly 30% a year instead of the seven or eight times investors once chased. Lee reads the same compression as rotation.

The two converge on the destination. Both expect fee-earning networks to absorb the flow, and both name Ethereum.

Ethereum trades near $1,873 after gaining 19.7% over 30 days. It still sits 51% lower across 12 months, and just over 2% below its trading price the previous day.

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Lee’s $11.8 Billion Reason to Prefer Ethereum

Lee chairs BitMine Immersion Technologies, the largest corporate holder of ether. The company disclosed 5.79 million ETH on July 27, close to 4.8% of circulating supply.

Crypto and cash holdings reached $11.8 billion. BitMine states the dependency plainly in its own investor materials.

“So our future price for Bitmine stock is heavily dependent on the future price of Ethereum,” Lee said in the July chairman’s message.

Lee puts the correlation between BitMine shares and ether at 90%. Anyone weighing his agent thesis is also weighing that balance sheet, which rallied this month on its ETH treasury bet.

The Numbers Do Not Match the Story Yet

Jansen Teng, co-founder and chief executive of Virtuals Protocol, shared the panel with Lee. His platform lets agents hold wallets and pay each other onchain, and his figures undercut the timeline.

Teng said the launchpad for agent tokens has cleared about $15 billion in trading volume. Agent-to-agent commerce has settled roughly $500 million in a year.

Speculating on agents is therefore some 30 times larger than agents transacting. Both figures are company-reported and have not been independently verified.

Teng said the agents kept $2.5 million in profit, and that the product has not reached product-market fit (PMF). Virtuals commissioned the Fundstrat research and is a client of the firm.

Its VIRTUAL token trades near $0.56, down 89% from a January 2025 peak, even after agents started trading tokenized stocks onchain.

So the question is not whether the AI trade ended. It is whether machine payments arrive before the balance sheets betting on them need the story to work.

The post Tom Lee vs Jordi Visser on the AI Trade: Both End Up at Ethereum appeared first on BeInCrypto.

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The team behind Pi Network set a deadline for its next big upgrade, while Solana’s native token risks plunging to as low as $50.

Bitcoin (BTC) may also head south, but interestingly, some analysts believe such a move could actually benefit the bulls.

Pi Network’s Announcement

The Core Team has been on a tear since the start of 2026, unveiling several major ecosystem improvements. The latest was the migration to protocol version 25, which was supposed to be deployed earlier this month.

Pi Network’s team did not disclose the move on X or on its website, yet multiple users claimed that it was in effect. The project has now shifted its attention to the next protocol update (version 26), setting August 11 as the deadline.

“All Mainnet note operators must complete the upgrade before the deadline to remain connected to the network,” the post reads.

The team also shared additional details about its Pi Launchpad model. It explained that in this ecosystem, projects issue tokens as tools to acquire users for their applications and integrate those coins directly into product functionality, such as rewards, payments, access, and governance.

“Instead of being taken by the issuing project, the proceeds of Pi from their token launch go to a liquidity pool with the ecosystem token, which bootstraps a healthy liquidity foundation from the start,” the team added.

PI, which was bleeding heavily prior to the aforementioned announcements, managed to rebound and now trades at around $0.08. Still, it remains down roughly 97% from its all-time high of $3 registered last year.

SOL at Risk

Solana’s native cryptocurrency has slipped by 3% over the past week, currently trading at around $73.50. This means that it has plunged below the $73.75 mark, which the popular analyst Ali Martinez recently described as a “make-or-break” level.

He believes that a sustained close under this key zone might trigger further selling pressure and result in a collapse to $60 and even $50 in the near future.

However, not all are pessimists. X user Crypto Zenkai argued that buying SOL below $80 is like investing in Bitcoin (BTC) in 2010, while Lucky told his nearly 2 million followers that the asset’s plunge under $75 might represent a “juicy dip.”

BTC Needs to Fall?

As of press time, the primary cryptocurrency is worth approximately $63,800, a 2.5% decline on a weekly basis. And while bulls eagerly await a resurgence, Martinez claimed they should actually welcome a potential drop to $60K.

He believes that a plunge to that level would validate the formation of a classic inverse head-and-shoulders pattern that is typically seen as a precursor to a rally. The analyst opined that completing the setup, combined with a confirmed breakout above $66,500, could set the stage for a rally to a two-month high of $74K.

Not long ago, Martinez predicted that BTC’s bear market (assuming the 4-year cycle holds) may conclude between October 6 and October 16. Until then, many industry participants expect the asset’s price to plunge below $50,000 and even $40,000. The most bearish forecast came from X user BATMAN, who claimed that BTC’s recent performance mirrors that of the autumn of 2022, which was followed by a giant collapse to roughly $16,000.

The post Recent Pi Network (PI) Updates, Solana (SOL) Warning, and More: Bits Recap July 31 appeared first on CryptoPotato.

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