Report archive · 15.09.2026

INDICIA Radar

Case No. 20260915 · 15.09.2026

Everyone will see 35,000 ether calls bought overnightthe asymmetry is the $74M of ether shorts the top perp whales added the same day.

Case #20260915 · 15.09.2026 04:24 UTC · BTC $77,614 / ETH $2,496 · analysis: Opus 5 by Anthropic

📅YESTERDAY

Monday's 14.09 expiry settled at 08:00 UTC. BTC came in at $77,766 — 1% from max pain, a match counted right at the edge of tolerance, and the market-maker break-even corridor held. ETH settled at $2,521 — exactly on max pain, and the corridor held there too.

The corridor has held in both assets for a sixth day running. The code closed no case over the day; the registry took in five new ones.

⚡THE GIST

• Yesterday's break in ether reversed within a day: when ETH touched $2,615, the top Hyperliquid whales added $74M of shorts, and their short-over-long tilt jumped to 2.0 times from 1.7.

• The ether options market went the other way: overnight on Deribit 35,000 calls just above the market for Thursday 17.09 were bought in blocks — that expiry became four times heavier in a day.

• BTC ran up to $79,596 on the Deribit perpetual over the day and came back: the whales cut both shorts and longs, and the week's two biggest new shorts dropped out of the top six.

• The funds came back from the weekend as buyers: on Monday $160M went into the BTC funds — the first inflow after four days of selling — and $121M into the ETH funds.

• Verdict — break ⚡: in ether the perp whales and the call buyers on options now face opposite ways — the two lenses split a day after they agreed.

• 📊 Our Polygon — Pendulum: standing position, +$9,642 in total since 11.05 — $314 less than in yesterday's snapshot.

• 📊 Our Polygon — signals: best — Dust Strategy V2 +$88,469 at a 5% win rate · worst — Wheel Trail V8 −$8,787. Table at the bottom.

🐋WHALES: WHAT CHANGED — three arenas

Arena one — Hyperliquid futures. The two assets split again, but not the way they did yesterday.
In ETH the top whales' long side shrank by 8% over the day and the short side grew by 12% — and the weekly window shows the whole week's shift of ether toward short was made in the last day (how we track whale positions). In BTC, after the daytime spike to $79,596, both sides shrank: the short by a sixth, the long by a fifth. In dollars more shorts were closed, so BTC's net tilt moved $42M toward long over the day, even though the ratio rose to 3.0 times.
Overleveraged whales under watch: 60 against 62 yesterday, two thirds of them now long, and three are close to a margin call — yesterday there were none. One forced closure among the top whales, $2.3M, on the long side.

Arena two — Deribit options. Two separate whale positions, and today both sit on calls.
The first — quiet accumulation in small lots outside the blocks. In BTC all three of the biggest footprints are now calls, above the market or near it. In ETH the build-up at the nearest call strike above the market almost tripled over the day, but most of it is the overnight blocks — more on them below.
The second — block trades (what a block is). Over two days the snapshot recognised three times as many structures as yesterday, in both BTC and ETH. The most visible is in ETH: an overnight series of blocks on calls just above the market to Thursday, bought after ether had already rolled back from the day's high. Among the repeats in BTC — a call spread and a sold call ceiling to Friday.

Arena three — money at the exchange border. A third day without large tranches.
In 24 hours two batches of ETH from exchange deposit addresses crossed the border, about $1.5M together, plus ZEC both ways.
The "bridge" channel is USDC cash: over seven days $37.3M came in and $10.8M went out — inflow three times the outflow. The "Unit" channel gave back almost as much ETH over the week as it took in.
Where the withdrawals go: 28% of everything withdrawn went to exchange addresses, against 27% yesterday. Border snapshot 15.09, 04:24 UTC.

This is positioning, not a direction forecast.

🧭CROSS-CHECK — five camps of witnesses

Witnesses are independent data sources that back up or contradict the whales' positions.

What the funds are doing. Spot ETFs are the only camp that measures purchases of the coin itself, not a leveraged position.
On Monday 14.09 $160M went into the BTC funds — the first inflow after four days of selling, led by BlackRock's IBIT and Fidelity's FBTC.
The week to 14.09 is still negative: −$303M against +$987M the week before.
Into the ETH funds went $121M on Monday; the week is +$318M against +$218M the week before.
This contradicts the ether whales: the funds buy ETH on the very day the perp whales build a short against it.

What the options market says. This camp measures one thing: what insurance costs on Deribit.
Our fear-and-greed index stands at 86 out of 100 against 87 yesterday — greed holds, even as insurance gets dearer for a third day.
BTC two-day vol sits in the 65th percentile of its own hourly history since February against the 40th yesterday — dearer than in most hours (what implied vol is).
ETH skew is −0.8: ether calls are dearer than puts, though on the two-day tenor the gap compressed to 4 vol points from 7 (what skew is).
This contradicts the ether whales: the perp whales add shorts, while the options market still pays up for ether upside.

What the futures say. This camp measures who pays whom to hold a position.
ETH funding on Hyperliquid is +0.003% in eight-hour terms against +0.010% yesterday — longs on ether now pay a third as much (what funding is). BTC stays at +0.010%, as yesterday.
This confirms the ether whales: demand for a leveraged ether long cooled exactly when the whales went short.

What the crowd is doing. This camp measures how retail accounts stand against the whales.
On Bybit perps 57% of BTC accounts stand long against 60% yesterday — retail cut longs into the spike. ETH stays at 67%, as yesterday.
The gap between the crowd and the whales in ETH widened to 34.2 points from 30.0; in BTC it compressed and came off its monthly maximum.
This confirms the ether whales: retail holds the long, the whales walk away from it — and the distance grew again over the day.

Any signs of stress. This camp measures whether anyone has already been forced out of the market.
On OKX swaps $2.6M was liquidated over the day, almost all of it shorts — a quarter of the week's volume, cleared out by the daytime BTC spike. Among the top Hyperliquid whales, one forced closure of $2.3M, on the long side.
This contradicts the whales' BTC short: the day's only notable cascade took out shorts, and the week's big new shorts left the top six.

Again: this is positioning, not a direction forecast.

🌡ALTSEASON — the classic and our barometer

The classic altseason index stands at 31.4 out of 100 — bitcoin-season territory; over the week it ranged between 28 and 40 with no direction.

Our barometer watches money, not prices: open interest, funding and retail come from Bybit perps, the whales from the Hyperliquid registry. Alts' share of open interest is 41.7% — $4.38B of $10.51B.

Alt contracts with funding hotter than bitcoin's make up 58% of open interest — in the upper half of the week's range.

Retail in the top-10 coins stands 69.5% long; the hottest are DOGE and XRP at 78% and 75%.

Whales in alts are structurally short: 34.1% long across $1.14B of positions, the biggest of them HYPE. That gap is permanent; the signal is in its CHANGE — and over the day it didn't move.

Full barometer: indiciadesk.com/en/altseason

⚖️VERDICT OF THE DAY

break ⚡ — yesterday's agreement of the lenses in ether lasted one day: the perp whales turned to a $74M short, while call buyers on options picked up a series of blocks for 35,000 contracts overnight. In bitcoin the daytime spike cleared out shorts, and the perps moved toward long. The ether witnesses split: the funds and the options market stand against the whales, funding and the crowd stand with them.

What this does NOT mean. It isn't a claim that ETH goes down or up. When perp whales and option call buyers push on one asset from opposite sides, there is no shared view — and a positioning snapshot doesn't show how that dispute resolves.

🔒In today's full RADAR:

— the market's biggest ether short grew over the day and put back more margin than it had pulled the day before — and who it is;

— five new whale cases, among them a sold call ceiling to Friday — legs, premiums and payoff profiles.

ANALYST access → indiciadesk.com/en/agent

💎DEEP

🔒WHALES IN DETAIL 💠

Portraits from the Hyperliquid registry, snapshot 03:16 UTC. Nicknames aren't treated as identification.

The market's biggest loss — added size and topped up margin. ETH SHORT $268.2M, leverage 5×, entry $2,296, uPnL −$21.6M, liquidation at $3,574 — 43% above spot. Over the day the position grew by $25.7M and the average entry rose from $2,270 — the short was added above earlier prices. Account $116.6M against $94.4M yesterday: more margin went back in than came out the day before.
The same address in BTC. SHORT $146.9M, leverage 5×, entry $72,307, uPnL −$10.2M, liquidation at $139,363 (+80%) — size unchanged, and the buffer to liquidation grew thanks to the margin.
A second address with the same pattern. ETH SHORT $179.8M and BTC SHORT $68.4M, both at 5× leverage, uPnL −$14.0M and −$7.9M, liquidations at $3,537 (+42%) and $164,585 on a $71.7M account against $63.0M yesterday. The ETH short grew by $25.6M over the day, entry up from $2,264 to $2,303. Together the two addresses carry $53.6M of unrealised loss against $55.8M yesterday.
The third big ether short — the account reinforced. ETH SHORT $47.9M, entry $2,281, uPnL −$4.1M. The size is almost the same, but the account grew from $22.0M to $38.1M, and the liquidation moved out to $4,197 — 68% above spot against 37% yesterday.
The big new BTC shorts — gone. Yesterday's BTC SHORT $81.5M at 20× and BTC SHORT $35.4M at 40×, with liquidation 8% above spot, no longer appear in the top six: after the daytime spike to $79,596 both positions were closed or cut below $17.9M. Both addresses carry no public label.
The market's biggest gains hold. ETH LONG $49.9M at 4× from $1,936, uPnL +$11.2M, account $11.6M; ETH LONG $75.6M at 20× from $2,134, uPnL +$11.0M, liquidation at $1,759 (−30%). Neither ETH long has changed in size over the week.
The risky side. ETH LONG $98.0M at 25× with liquidation at $2,426 — 3% under spot, and BTC LONG $42.3M at 40×, liquidation at $72,608 (−6%). Account $5.5M against $5.8M yesterday — margin shrinking for a second day.
New in the BTC top six. LONG $23.3M at 40× from $77,186, liquidation at $64,417 (−17%), account $4.8M; SHORT $17.9M at 21× from $77,927, liquidation at $105,214. Both self-labelled. Next to them a SHORT of $31.1M at 10× from $78,041, liquidation at $105,360 (+36%), also self-labelled, held for at least a week.

Cases in the registry — five new over the day (#1074–#1078), all from Deribit.
Case #1074 · BTC bear call spread: 250 calls at $81,000 sold, 250 calls at $83,000 bought, expiry 18.09.2026 — 500 contracts, entered at $77,788, first day. Net premium about 0.58 BTC received (≈$45k): the whale is paid for BTC not settling above $81,000 by Friday 18.09. In the block snapshot the same structure went through three more times.

Профіль виплат на експірацію 2026-09-18. Кит отримав $45k премії. Беззбитковість: $81 179.

Case #1078 · BTC put diagonal across two expiries: 14 puts at $78,000 bought for 18.09.2026, 14 puts at $79,000 sold for 27.11.2026 — 28 contracts, entered at $77,788, first day. Net premium about 0.77 BTC received (≈$60k): the sold far leg is already in the money, the bought near leg is protection to Friday.

Профіль виплат на експірацію 2026-09-18. Кит отримав $60k премії. Беззбитковості в показаному діапазоні немає.

Case #1075 · BTC call diagonal across two autumn expiries: 50 calls at $79,000 sold for 02.10.2026, 50 calls at $80,000 bought for 30.10.2026 — 100 contracts, entered at $77,788, first day. Net premium about 0.82 BTC paid (≈$64k) — the same shape as yesterday's case #1072, $1,000 higher.

Профіль виплат на експірацію 2026-10-02. Кит заплатив $63k премії. Беззбитковості в показаному діапазоні немає.

Case #1070 · ETH call ratio spread: 500 calls at $2,550 bought, 750 calls at $2,760 sold, expiry 18.09.2026 — 1,250 contracts, entered at $2,512, second day. Net premium about 6.4 ETH paid (≈$16k). Yesterday ether went through the bought strike up to $2,615 and came back below it.

Профіль виплат на експірацію 2026-09-18. Кит заплатив $16k премії. Беззбитковість: $2 582.

Case #948 · ETH condor at $1,700/$1,900/$2,800/$3,000, size 11,500, expiry 25.09.2026 — twenty-first day, net premium about 36.8 ETH received (≈$91k). The registry still holds the case open, even though on Sunday a block mirrored all four legs in the same sizes; the $3,000 call on this expiry shed another 1,274 contracts over the day.

Профіль виплат на експірацію 2026-09-25. Кит отримав $91k премії. Беззбитковість: $1 867 і $2 830.

Also new: #1076 BTC call diagonal (25 calls at $78,000 bought for today 15.09, 25 calls at $78,500 sold for 17.09, about 0.20 BTC received) and #1077 BTC call diagonal for 27.11 and 25.12 (about 0.23 BTC paid).
Settlement of 14.09 on yesterday's cases. At $77,766 the sold $76,000 put leg of #1067 expired worthless, the sold $77,500 call leg of #1068 ended $266 in the money, and the bought $78,000 call of #1073 expired. The code hasn't closed these cases yet — the far legs are still in play.
ΔOI over the week, both ways: in BTC the top three are calls only — +2,222 calls at $81,000 and +2,040 at $85,000 (each across 8 expiries) and +1,792 at $78,000. ETH: +69,142 calls at $2,600 (76% in the 16.09 and 17.09 expiries) and +26,712 at $2,700 against +12,674 puts at $2,300.

🔬Who exactly

Both of the biggest shorts are Abraxas Capital Mgmt (Heka Funds). Over the day the house grew the ETH short on its two addresses by $51.3M together, adding above its earlier entry, and put $30.9M of margin back into the two accounts — after yesterday's $16.4M outflow. The BTC shorts were left alone.

The third big ETH short is Fasanara Capital: size unchanged, margin raised by $16.1M — the liquidation moved almost twice as far away.

The risky 25× ETH long and the 40× BTC long are Machi Big Brother: $140M together on a $5.5M account.

The 10× BTC short is self-labelled VBVIT; the new 40× BTC long is self-labelled MoonpathCliff; the 21× BTC short is self-labelled CamassKirby5595. Nicknames aren't treated as identification.

The market's biggest gains and both vanished BTC shorts belong to addresses without a public label.

Money by address. The Abraxas and Fasanara margin didn't come across the exchange border in large tranches — over the day only ETH from Binance deposit addresses worth $0.78M and $0.70M crossed it, plus ZEC both ways to a private address. Over the week the coin channel handed BTC worth $4.3M and $3.0M to Wintermute, and BTC worth $4.2M and $3.3M came in via Binance.

🔒THE WEEK'S DYNAMICS 🔬

Perps. BTC: net $281M short (long $142M against short $423M), $24M toward short over 7 days, but $42M toward long over the day — the week's first reversal, made by closing shorts. ETH: net $346M short (long $329M against $675M), $52M toward short over 7 days, $101M over the day — yesterday's build of ether longs was outweighed three times over.

Gamma flip. BTC $70,173 — up 828 over the week, down 122 over the day. ETH $2,243 — down 41 over the week, down 27 over the day; ether's put wall rose 380 over the week (what the flip is).

The price of fear. On the weekly window the premium is negative: IV 38.8 against realised HV 41.6 — minus 2.8 against minus 3.3 yesterday, compressed by 1.8 over 7 days. The daytime spike lifted both the actual move and the price of options, but options got dearer faster.

Changing of the guard. Over the week the whales assembled 180 confirmed structures: 53 bullish, 41 bearish, 20 on volatility, 66 on range — against 163 yesterday, when the window held 42 bullish and 37 bearish.

🔒CROSS-CHECK IN DETAIL 💠

BTC levels. Everything below comes from Deribit options open interest. The market-maker break-even corridor is $77,000–$79,000 against $76,000–$78,000 yesterday — it rose after spot, with spot near its bottom; by our study across 382 expiries price stays inside such a corridor in roughly 82% of cases (what the corridor is). Max pain $78,000 against $77,000 (what max pain is). Today's 15.09 expiry is light — 3,154 contracts.

The week's landmark — Friday 18.09. BTC: 18,254 contracts, max pain $78,000, put wall $72,000 on 2,421, call wall $82,000 on 1,743 — and the neighbouring $81,000 on 1,397, where today's case #1074 sold its ceiling (what the walls are). ETH: 118,969 contracts, max pain $2,500, put wall $2,200 on 7,897, call wall $2,800 on 23,095.

Thursday 17.09 in ether. 54,278 contracts against 13,975 yesterday; call wall $2,600 on 40,452 contracts — 35,000 calls came in here overnight in blocks. Max pain for this expiry is $2,500.

ETH levels. The corridor is $2,480–$2,580, unchanged, max pain $2,520. The level walls — put wall $2,100 and call wall $2,560 — come from Tuesday's 15.09 expiry; the week's heaviest call wall sits on Thursday, see above.

The quarterly, 25.09. BTC: max pain $72,000, put and call densest at $70,000 (9,414 and 10,957). ETH: max pain $2,200, put $2,100 on 37,769, call $3,000 on 42,705.

Fuel. Above BTC $31.0M of short positions in the $79,240–81,570 band against $46.7M yesterday — a third of it cleared by the daytime spike. Below the market $22.7M of longs in the $73,802–76,132 band against $39.5M. In ETH the long fuel under the market is $111.2M in the $2,372–2,447 band, and the short fuel above is $9.9M in the $2,547–2,622 band against almost nothing yesterday: a band of short fuel appeared above ether. This is about the RANGE of a move for the same push, not about a higher probability of that move (what the fuel map is).

Gamma vacuum. In BTC it's dense above spot; empty below, at $73,000–$74,000. In ETH dense above spot; empty below, at $2,350–$2,400.

Stress test ±2%. For BTC and ETH, a 2% move from spot either way leaves the dealers in positive gamma — the move gets damped.

OI flow. BTC put/call across all expiries: month 0.56 · week 0.55 · now 0.55 — stable; ETH 0.52 · 0.55 · 0.51 — ether's open interest is the most call-heavy of the week (what put/call is).

Two options venues. BTC put/call on the same expiries up to 30 days: 0.54 on Deribit against 1.12 on Bybit — Bybit's open interest got more put-heavy for a third day; ETH 0.52 against 0.85, and 0.78 yesterday. We don't know who owns the Bybit positions, so this is neither "whales" nor "retail" — just a second venue with a different lean.

IV by tenor. BTC 2d P45/C44 · 10d P39/C38 · 17d P38/C38, percentiles since February 65th, 41st and 37th. ETH 2d P59/C63 · 10d P55/C56 · 17d P54/C54, percentiles 65th, 50th and 45th. BTC DVOL 38.8 against 30-day realised 33.3 — a premium of +5.5 against +4.3 yesterday; ETH DVOL 54.6, premium +5.8 (what the premium is).

💎SCENARIOS IN DETAIL 💠

The code's verdicts for yesterday. The scenarios from 12.09 are closed: "The corridor holds" — partially, BTC spent 81% of the time inside the band; "Burn-up through the short fuel" — not confirmed, the high of $77,565 didn't reach $78,800; "Slide into the long fuel" — not confirmed, the low of $76,676 didn't reach $75,700. The code cancelled "Slide into the long fuel" from 13.09 and from 14.09 on their cancellation levels: the day's high of $79,170 on the spot index the code uses went through both cancellation levels. The corridor and burn-up from 13.09 run their course today at 05:00 UTC, those from 14.09 tomorrow. The week since 08.09: 21 scenarios — 5 confirmed, 1 partially, 4 not, 7 hit their cancellation level, 4 still running. Whole history: corridor 8 of 20 plus 4 partial, burn-up 6 of 24, slide into the long fuel 4 of 15 — the directional types run worse than a coin toss, the corridor type under half.

The corridor holds — 40%. ⏱ 2 days, to Thursday 17.09. BTC stays between the fuel bands, $76,150–$79,200. Cancellation level: a touch of $73,800 — the bottom of the long-fuel band.

Burn-up through the short fuel — 30%. ⏱ 2 days, to 17.09. Trigger: a touch of $79,250 — the bottom of the band of short positions. Cancellation level: a touch of $76,130.

Slide into the long fuel — 30%. ⏱ 2 days, to 17.09. Trigger: a touch of $76,130 — the top of the band of long positions. Cancellation level: a touch of $79,250.

This is how we weigh the odds — not a promise; the code will compute the verdict from spot history.

🔭WHAT TO WATCH

• Thursday 17.09, 08:00 UTC: settlement of the ether expiry holding 40,452 calls at $2,600 — the week's biggest cluster on a single day; ether spot sits 4% below it (💠).

• Abraxas Capital: the house adds to its ETH short above the average entry and puts margin back — if ether returns to the $2,600 area, that tests whether the house keeps adding (🔬).

• The ETF funds: Monday brought the first BTC inflow after four days of selling — the second day shows whether the week turns (🔬).

🆓TAIL

📊POLYGON

(our own signals at real prices, not a backtest)

⚙️Pendulum · Wheel (standing position, real prices)

+$0 on the day · +$9,642 in total · since 11.05.2026

⭐ Top-5 signals ($1,000 per signal; "total" is the sum of all trades, not the return on a single thousand):

signal                    trades   win    last     total  since
Dust Strategy V2              41    5% −$1,125  +$88,469  21.03
Dust Strategy V1              34    9% −$1,125  +$33,656  20.03
Volatility Convergence V3     27   44%   −$261  +$13,542  26.05
Skew 2.0 V2                   39   36%   −$722  +$11,040  26.05
Fear Flash V2                 22   32%   −$418   +$3,023  16.05

Deepest in the red: Wheel Trail V8 −$8,787 · Wheel Trail V6 −$7,718 · Wheel Trail V7 −$6,179 — all three variants of one signal went deeper by $597 together over the day: a signal that hunts a reversal paid for another attempt on the day BTC ran to $79,596 and came back. The Pendulum stands at +$9,642 in total against +$9,956 in yesterday's snapshot, although the "on the day" line shows zero — the gap is in the summary itself, and we're checking it. A third day without closed trades in the top five. The most profitable signal — Dust Strategy V2 — wins only 5% of its 41 trades. Win rate isn't money.

📅PUBLIC LEDGER

(computed by code at the settlement price)

The market-maker corridor. Across 382 expiries since February the market-maker break-even corridor held the settlement price 313 times — 82%. Monday's 14.09 expiry held in both assets — a sixth day running. Decision: we lean on the corridor, knowing that roughly one expiry in five it doesn't hold.

Max pain. An exact match with the settlement in 36% of those same 382 expiries. Yesterday ETH matched exactly, BTC right at the edge of tolerance, 0.98% apart. Decision: we don't chase max pain — four days of matches in a row lift the share by less than a point.

The walls. The call wall held the settlement in 49% of expiries, the put wall in 42%: roughly a coin toss. Decision: a wall without an expiry and a contract count isn't published as a level; ether's Thursday call wall is 40,452 contracts on one strike, and walls like that are the first we check.

Whale structures by type (our Deribit registry, 721 closed cases). Bear call spread — the type of the day's biggest new case: 60 closed, only 20% matched by strikes, −$891k in total for the whales. Call diagonal — three more new cases: 49 closed, −$1.58M in total. Condor: 36 closed, 69% matched, yet −$126k in total. All closed cases together: −$5.9M for the whales. Decision: win rate isn't money, and we don't copy whale structures — we track where they stand.

Polygon. Pendulum +$9,642 since 11.05, $314 below yesterday's snapshot. The Dust Strategy: 75 trades across both versions and +$122k together, a third day without new trades. The Wheel Trail: three variants in the bottom three, −$597 together over the day. Decision: we publish both tallies daily with the same denominator; we keep Dust Strategy because it makes money despite its win rate, and the Wheel Trail is the first thing we look at in every review.

📏Scale calibrator

• What protection costs. Our fear-and-greed index — 86 out of 100. We compute it from the price of volatility and the option skew on Deribit, not from news, which is why it diverges from the well-known index.

• Cheap or expensive for this market itself. BTC two-day vol — 65th percentile of the hourly history since February, ten-day — 41st, seventeen-day — 37th: the near tenor is already dearer than most hours, the far ones are still cheaper.

• Which way protection tilts. BTC skew +0.8: puts slightly dearer than calls, the market pays extra for protection against a bitcoin fall; ETH skew −0.8 — the reverse, the market pays up for ether upside. Terms: indiciadesk.com/en/glossary/

Not investment advice and not a recommendation to trade. Derivatives trading carries a high risk of loss; INDICIA DESK is a research publisher, not an adviser licensed by MAS, the SEC or the FCA — decisions and their consequences are yours.