| July 18, 2025 | | | | | Jeff Bergstrom
Editor
John Lothian News | |
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| | | | Lead Stories | | | Why Options Mania Is a Contrarian Indicator
Spencer Jakab - The Wall Street Journal
This used to be a day when the stock market turned its gaze elsewhere: the options pits. There's still a reason to pay attention.
Options markets are bigger than ever, but they no longer march to a monthly rhythm. That makes the traditional focus on contract expiration, on the third Friday of the month, about as quaint as those tiered floors filled with gesticulating clerks.
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Crypto Market Value Tops $4 Trillion as Stablecoin Bill Passes
Sidhartha Shukla - Bloomberg
The options market shows traders are increasing bets for even higher prices in the weeks ahead, with elevated open interest in options at $130,000 for August 1 expiry, according to Deribit data.
The total market value of cryptoassets surged past $4 trillion for the first time, driven by a rally in altcoins and momentum from a sweeping US legislative push to regulate the sector.
The options market shows traders are increasing bets for even higher prices in the weeks ahead.
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Jane Street's Trading Secrets Spill Into Open and Face Rivals' Scrutiny; A regulatory probe and bond documents show how a $42 billion war chest and an embrace of risk drive profits
Katherine Doherty and Bernard Goyder - Bloomberg
A poster with the WWII slogan "Loose Lips Sink Ships" long adorned the interior of Jane Street Group's offices - an unsubtle reminder to staff of the secrecy prized by one of Wall Street's most profitable firms. Now the 25-year-old trading powerhouse is in the glare of a global spotlight. It's a privately controlled company so clandestine that it doesn't publicly identify a leader at the top. A staffer who once tried to track down an email list of governing partners recalled giving up, learning that Jane Street doesn't want something like that circulating, not even to people working there.
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Bitcoin treasury firms are a better bet than crypto ETFs, says Twenty-One Capital CEO Jack Mallers
Leo Schwartz - Fortune
At a time when Bitcoin broke the $120,000 mark for the first time, Wall Street's appetite is growing for new ways to hold the first-and largest-cryptocurrency. The latest vehicle: publicly traded companies that hold Bitcoin in their treasuries. On the inaugural episode of Fortune's vodcast Crypto Playbook, Jack Mallers-a prominent Bitcoin champion and the CEO and cofounder of the new Bitcoin treasury company Twenty-One Capital-argued that betting on firms whose sole goal is to accumulate more Bitcoin is a superior way for traditional investors to get access to the red-hot asset class. Pioneered by Michael Saylor's technology company MicroStrategy, many firms have recently adopted the approach of using balance sheet capital to buy Bitcoin, with some launching over the past few months. Those include the upstart Twenty-One Capital, which is backed by stablecoin leader Tether and tech investment giant Softbank and led Mallers, a 31-year-old known for founding the Bitcoin company Strike and leading efforts to push global adoption, including in El Salvador through his work with President Nayib Bukele.
/jlne.ws/4eXPAfl
This Under-the-Radar Stablecoin Just Exploded 337%-And It's Reshaping How Businesses Think About Crypto
Nick Thomas - Benzinga
The crypto payments landscape just experienced its most dramatic shift in years, and it's not what most investors saw coming. While Bitcoin grabbed headlines with its price volatility, a quieter revolution was unfolding in the world of digital commerce-one that could reshape how businesses and consumers think about cryptocurrency transactions.The Stablecoin Shakeup That Changed Everything. According to CoinGate's H1 2025 Crypto Payments Report, USDC usage exploded by 337% in the first half of 2025, catapulting it into the top five cryptocurrencies and capturing a dominant 68% share of all crypto payouts. This wasn't just growth-it was a seismic shift that saw USDC overtake Tether in payment volume by June.
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University of California fund ditches hedge funds with scathing rebuke; Chief investment officer says stocks and bonds would have prevented 'all the drama'
Sun Yu and Amelia Pollard - Financial Times
The $190bn manager of the University of California's endowment and pension has divested from hedge funds as its chief investment officer lambasted the industry for failing to provide adequate risk protection. UC Investments in a meeting on Tuesday approved a plan to reallocate its 10 per cent absolute return portfolio - or its investments in hedge funds - to public equities, finalising a wind-down that began five years ago.
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| | | | Exchanges | | | Tales of the Tape: The Liz & Jny & Cathy Show
Cboe (Video)
In the third episode of Cboe's Tales of the Tape podcast, Cboe's Cathy Clay, Executive Vice President, Global Head of Derivatives, joins Liz Dierking and Jenny Andrews, the hosts of tastylive's The LIZ and JNY Show, to discuss their journeys in the options industry.
Cathy, Liz and Jenny - who all started their careers on an options trading floor - share their perspectives on the evolution of open outcry trading, how their beginnings in options trading shaped them today, the role of a market maker, cultural differences between pits and the necessity of financial education.
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ETF Market Report: 2nd Quarter 2025; Discover the latest figures about the development of the ETF segment at SIX Swiss Exchange, one of Europe's top 3 ETF venues - including statistics for Quote on Demand (QOD).
SIX
With turnover of CHF 31.89 billion and 840,726 transactions, the figures for the Swiss ETF market was at the same level as the previous quarter. They continued to significantly exceed the figures of the previous year. The number of trades is now already at 68.61% of the previous year, while the average trade size was CHF 40,158. In terms of ticket sizes, the slight upward trend in trades over 1,000,000 continued. The median confirmed the trend reversal that emerged in the previous quarter. The value in the first half of the year was 11.33% higher than in the previous year. The range of newly listed ETFs on SIX Swiss Exchange increased by 108 units in the second quarter, 37 more units than in the previous quarter. On 30 June the total number of ETFs listed at SIX Swiss Exchange amounted to 2,025 units. This is the first time the 2,000 mark has been exceeded. The many new listings primarily comprised equity and bond ETFs. On the other hand, there was a remarkable lack of new products in the commodities segment, despite it having recently attracted renewed interest from investors. The increasing frequency of new listings underscores the ongoing momentum surrounding this extremely popular segment on SIX Swiss Exchange.
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| | | | Regulation & Enforcement | | | FIA CEO Lukken testifies on federal oversight of digital commodities; US Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Stakeholder Perspectives on Federal Oversight of Digital Commodities
FIA
Chairman Boozman, Ranking Member Klobuchar and Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify about the regulation of digital commodities.
I am President and CEO of FIA, the leading trade organization for the futures, options and cleared derivatives markets globally. Prior to FIA, I had the honor of working for this Committee during the passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act (CFMA) of 2000. I then went on to serve as a Commissioner and Acting Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) for seven years, which included leading the agency during the financial crisis of 2008.
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India's ban on Jane Street raises concerns over regulator role; India's order banning Jane Street for alleged price manipulation has raised concerns over investor protection and regulator's role.
Saumya Roy - Al Jazeera
Indian tax authorities and market regulator are considering widening their probe of United States trading giant Jane Street Group to investigate it for tax evasion in addition to an earlier charge of price rigging in the Bombay Stock Exchange's benchmark Sensex, according to media reports.
The tax evasion charge comes on the heels of market regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), seizing 48.43 billion rupees ($570m) and banning four Jane Street-related entities from operating in the market for alleged price manipulation in the National Stock Exchange (NSE).
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| | | | Strategy | | | US companies adopt options strategies to shield euro revenues in case dollar recovers
Laura Matthews - Reuters
Some U.S. companies are taking advantage of more attractive pricing in euro options to protect the revenues they expect from Europe against losses, fearing the common currency may have strengthened a bit too far.
The euro rose against the dollar after the U.S. rolled out larger-than-expected tariffs in April, knocking the buck to a three-year low and raising concerns about U.S. assets, its exceptionalism and economic growth.
/jlne.ws/3GSCDa8
As the S&P 500 Reaches New Heights, A Simple Options Strategy Defines Investor Risk
Adan Harris - TradeAlgo
Markets continued their sharp upward trajectory on Friday, as U.S. equities climbed higher at the open. This followed a strong performance the previous day, with both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 closing at fresh all-time highs. It marked the ninth record close for the S&P 500 this year, underscoring the strength of the ongoing rally.
While there is confidence that the S&P 500 will continue its upward trend through the summer, some investors are turning to options strategies to manage potential downside risks. With market sentiment heavily tilted toward bullishness and short sellers retreating rapidly, the rally may be due for a pause or pullback. As a result, the use of options-particularly through SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY)-is seen as a way to define exposure while remaining positioned for potential gains.
/jlne.ws/4nUujaw
VIX Extremes That Challenge Common Assumptions
tastylive - (Video)
Join Tom and Tony in this episode as they explore VIX extremes and significant market movements in 2025 comparing to most outliers happend in past 25 years (like 2008 and 2020). Discover how current volatility compares to historical patterns from 2008 and 2020, along with insights on trader performance amid fluctuating conditions. They delve into VIX patterns, comparing 2025's extreme moves to previous years, emphasizing historic drops and swings. They found that in April'25 we had the most daily VIX close drop down in history of -18.7 points The discussion underscores the rarity of significant VIX movements and suggests that, despite volatility, many traders have navigated the current market conditions successfully.
/jlne.ws/3UkTmG8
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| | | | John Lothian News (JLN) is the news division of John J. Lothian & Company, Inc. (JJLCO). The online media and financial services firm is staffed by derivatives industry, journalism and technology professionals. | | | | | | | John Lothian News Editorial Staff: | | | John Lothian
Publisher | | | Sarah Rudolph
Editor-in-Chief
| | | Jeff Bergstrom
Editor
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