How Will Markets React to $3B Crypto Options Expiring Today?

Another week’s end is here, which means another bunch of crypto options contracts expire while local markets continue to decline.

About 38,000 Bitcoin options contracts will expire on Friday, Feb. 13, with an estimated value of $2.5 billion. This event is a bit bigger than last week’s expiration.

Crypto markets remain in bear market territory, losing nearly $125 billion since the start of the week, as sentiment builds and the migration of stores and institutions continues.

Bitcoin Options Expiration

This week’s batch of Bitcoin options contracts has a put/call ratio of 0.76, meaning there are more expiring calls (longs) than puts (shorts). The big pain is about $75,000, according to Coinglass, which is higher than the current prices, many will be out of money when it expires.

Open interest (OI), or the amount or number of Bitcoin options contracts yet to expire, remains at an all-time high of $60,000 and is now rising to $50,000, with more than a billion dollars at these strike prices on Deribit as bearish bets increase. Total OI BTC options across all exchanges have been rising this month and are at $36.6 billion.

Derivatives analyst ‘Laevitas’ said there is a “bear spread” on Deribit, which involves buying a higher strike and selling a lower strike with the same expiration date.

“With BTC stabilizing and volume cooling from panic levels, the key question is whether the expiration acts as a magnet at $75K or paves the way for the next move,” Deribit said.

🚨 Out of Options Warning 🚨

At 08:00 UTC tomorrow, over $2.9B of crypto options expire on Deribit.$BTC: $2.53B psychologically | Install/Dial: 0.76 | Big pain: $75K$ETH: $406M psychologically | Install/Dial: 0.89 | Extreme pain: $2,150

After last week’s break under $70K resulted in eliminations and… pic.twitter.com/ZH2dgNglrC

– Deribit (@DeribitOfficial) February 12, 2026

“Put options continue to dominate the market, with more than 1 billion BTC options traded today, accounting for 37% of the total volume,” Greeks Live noted this week, adding that most of these “out-of-the-money options are priced between $60,000 and $65,000.”

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“This shows that institutions have a negative view of the market in the medium and long term, with strong expectations of bearish growth over the next one to two months.”

In addition to today’s batch of Bitcoin options, about 217,000 Ethereum contracts also expire, with a symbolic value of $406 million, a strike at $2,150, and a put/call ratio of 0.89. Total OI ETH options on all exchanges are around $7 billion. This brings the total value of crypto options expiring to around $2.9 billion.

Spot Market Outlook

Total market capitalization was down 1.5% on the day at $2.34 trillion as the sell-off continued. Bitcoin weakened again, falling just above $65,000 in late Thursday trading and trading just above $66,000 during Friday’s morning Asian session.

Analysts are mostly bearish, with many predicting a low near or below $55,000. Ether remains weak below $2,000, hitting $1,900 with an intraday low. BTC’s continued weakness will drag ETH down even further in the coming weeks.