Paradigm

Paradigm × Bullish: Institutional BTC Options Block Trading @Bullish is now live as a settlement venue on Paradigm for all clients. + No minimum block size + Price & execute large, multi-leg BTC options as a single block + Atomic settlement: no leg risk, no order book impact + Settles directly on Bullish with USDC margining Trade Now: paradigm.co

3/ Bottom-decile volatility doesn't tell you when the regime turns though. It tells you what each side is being paid to wait: short vol earns its thinnest premium of the year for the same tail. while convexity costs its least. Seasonality never tells you the catalyst, only which month the market habitually goes on a lull. Track the volatility on DIME Terminal → paradigm.co/dime-terminal

2/ Is the low seasonal? Largely yes, if we reference equities. The VIX historically troughs in July and surges in August. $BTC implied vol now trades as a high-beta cousin of the VIX. August and September are also one of $BTC's lowest-average returns months since 2010.

Paradigm Flash Analysis 1/ Volatility is the most mean-reverting force in this market, and $BTC DVOL is at 37.4, against a YTD low of ~35. Optionality is priced in the bottom decile of its one-year range right now. The positioning underneath matches this: Desks are overwriting calls just above spot and the 1-week 25d put skew compressed from ~25.4 vol pts on June 29 to 14.7 by July 14.

CEX options did ~$256B over the last 60 days; the entire on-chain market did $3.47B. An average CEX day has 23.5% more trading volume than all DeFi options traded in two months Now look at Paradigm's RFQ network alone, which did $25.5B, 7.4x all of defi combined, and it will soon be integrated into Paradex Crypto’s biggest liquidity layer is about to make institutional-size available on-chain at @Paradex

3/ So the read: this is a pause confirmed, not yet a renewed trend. What bulls want to see is consecutive positive inflow weeks, breadth beyond $IBIT, and volume returning with the inflows. Until then, the bleeding has stopped for now but the proof is still pending. Track the flows on DIME Terminal, soon → paradigm.co/dime-terminal

2/ Look inside the week and the inflow gets thinner: One day did all the work: Last Monday's +$266M was more than the whole week combined, because Wednesday and Thursday gave most of it back. One fund did all the buying, because Friday's inflow was almost entirely $IBIT. And it all happened on the quietest volume since Oct 2024.

Paradigm Flash Analysis: 1/ Last week we said the burden of proof was on the buyers. They showed up... barely. US spot $BTC ETFs took in $197M over the week of July 6–10, snapping an eight-week $8.3B outflow streak. The longest in the products' history.

Why institutions hide their options trades CEO @fiddybps1 on @dimetvhq explaining the privacy problem: + trading 1000 BTC? your order moves the market while you're executing + markets are reflexive. traders see your size, prices react. + you create adverse slippage against yourself + RFQ (Request for Quote) solves this: size, atomic execution, and privacy + your trade will settle without tipping off the market one price. full size. no slippage. Request access: paradigm.co/join

Buying and selling at the same time is harder than it sounds. Paradigm founder @fiddybps1 on @dimetvhq explains how Paradigm solves this: + on-demand liquidity, sourced in a single RFQ + every leg of a complex trade fills atomically, at the same moment + the dealer prices the whole package, so the fill beats going leg by leg + no leg risk, no half-executed position, no exposure mid-trade Source the liquidity, fill every leg, in one RFQ. Request access: paradigm.co/join

Yield vaults are the clear product-market-fit for on-chain options. The demand is there on TradFi, and it is here in crypto too There are more than $140B sitting in premium-income ETFs in the US, with crypto-related instruments having north of $2.7B in AUM, much more than any options product on-chain Between crypto equities and ETFs, only $BTCI from Neos has been live for more than a year, having netted 44.8% in the last 12 months The demand exists; what didn't exist before was the right infra to build it in DeFi. @paradex VTFs solve the infra for building products like these fully on-chain, while our RFQ liquidity network enables scalability for these strategies GigaVTF is the first of its kind... More vaults are coming to Paradex 🔜 Check them out 👉 app.paradex.trade/vaults

3/ Puts are cheapening and demand for downside hedges continues to fade, while spot holds the $63K-$64K region. Either the market has correctly repriced $BTC's geopolitical beta, or downside protection has rarely been this cheap into this much headline risk. Either way, market participants are definitely pricing in capped downside to $BTC at the current level. Gain an edge in options market analysis on Dime Terminal soon. paradigm.co/dime-terminal

2/ DVOL entered the week at ~41. It's now ~37. Implied volatility compressed through a live geopolitical escalation. For reference: February's selloff printed 25d put IV at 95%, the highest since 2022. Five months from panic pricing to traders selling the war headline.

Paradigm Flash Analysis: 1/ $BTC added 3.7% over a week that included an oil shock, a bond selloff, and two rounds of US strikes on Iran. The dip below $62K lasted less than 36 hours. The spot chart isn't the story. The vol surface is.

Paradigm founder @fiddybps1 on @dimetvhq breaks down what it takes to win the perps market: + three levers decide it: liquidity, fees, stable funding + liquidity is the hardest, a maker can't quote a thousand pairs at once + so long-tail books stay thin + RFQ sources liquidity on demand: cheaper than always-on Paradigm built this model for options in 2019. Now it's coming to perps. Request access: paradigm.co/join

Last night, from the first Paradigm Poker Night in London. 10 players. One table. Traders from @BHDigitalAssets, @CumberlandSays, @wintermute_t, @ryskfinance, @MarexGlobal, Susquehanna and more went head to head. Congrats to Kristian from @Nexo on the first title 🏆 We're back in August with 2 tables. Reach out to join the next one.

Paradigm's liquidity network will be integrated into Paradex soon. See how it can impact the platform + On-chain options daily volume averaged $57.6M in the last 60d + @tradeparadigm's average in the same period was $420M, more than 7x all the DEXes combined + Paradex had a total volume of ~$105M in the same period Now ask yourself: "how will this integration impact Paradex options volume?" Trade zero fee options on Paradex 24/7: app.paradex.trade/options

Block RFQ coming to Paradex – powered by Paradigm. • 70% of blocks price better than Deribit TOB • 80% of blocks are larger than Deribit TOB size • Paradigm blocks are 88x larger than Deribit TOB 👉 paradex.trade/stats

Buying and selling at the same time is harder than it sounds. Paradigm founder @fiddybps1 on @dimetvhq explains how Paradigm solves this: + on-demand liquidity, sourced in a single RFQ + every leg of a complex trade fills atomically, at the same moment + the dealer prices the whole package, so the fill beats going leg by leg + no leg risk, no half-executed position, no exposure mid-trade Source the liquidity, fill every leg, in one RFQ. Request access: paradigm.co/join

3/ And the calendar seller hasn't gone anywhere: Strategy still holds 843K BTC, $1.25B in authorized sale capacity untouched, record dates every 15th and month-end. Squeeze rallies don't need buyers to start. They need them to continue. Track squeeze vs. real demand on DIME terminal. Soon on paradigm.co/join

2/ So who is? Shorts, forcibly. The break above $62K liquidated ~$450M in shorts across multiple exchanges. Shorts covering =/= actual demand. ETFs just ended an 8-week, –$8.2B outflow streak with two days of inflows ($221M, then $266M).

Paradigm Flash Analysis: 1/ BTC is up ~10% in July and tagged $64.4K overnight. Everyone on the timeline is now calling the bottom. The tape disagrees though. Coinbase Premium has now been negative for 50 straight trading days, the longest streak since the indicator existed. The previous record was 40. US investors aren't buying this rally.