Unusual Option Talks? Why selling shovels not as good as selling golds?
BTC hits a new high, also the best-performing asset so far this year.
However, there is a differentiation among assets based on BTC as the underlying asset.
Among the assets that have kept up with BTC so far this year, besides the platform $Coinbase Global, Inc.(COIN)$ that barely meets the criteria, there is only $MicroStrategy(MSTR)$ who beats.
However, since March, two mining companies, $Marathon Digital Holdings Inc(MARA)$ and $Riot Blockchain, Inc.(RIOT)$ , have performed very weakly.
This might be because in the rebound last year, mining companies were leading the way with gains surpassing BTC, essentially pre-price-in considering the output is becoming increasingly difficult, which will impact performance.
Moreover, there is intense competition among mining companies, making it laborious with low conversion efficiency;
MSTR converts assets (through new bond issuances) into BTC, effectively adding a layer of leverage, thus outperforming BTC significantly since March.
COIN and similar platform companies maintain a high correlation with BTC, possibly slightly lower in terms of price increase, but also more relaxed during setbacks due to performance protection.
This is also why the current market situation reflects the situation of "selling shovels is not as good as selling gold".
From option unusual activity, there is a phenomenon of a large number of closing out of some at-the-money or near-the-money options on MARA, indicating a significant reduction in overnight speculative trading. In contrast, this situation has not occurred on COIN\MSTR. This also indirectly indicates that the current risk sentiment towards MARA is quickly falling.
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