Image Credit: ibit.com
Call-option trading in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF reached a record 1.58 million contracts on August 19 as Bitcoin rallied toward $80,000. The figure came from Goldman Sachs data highlighted by The Kobeissi Letter and marked IBIT’s highest daily call volume on record.
The activity remained elevated over the following two sessions. Roughly 1.3 million IBIT calls traded on both August 20 and August 21, keeping daily call volume above one million contracts for three consecutive trading days.
IBIT Call Skew Rises Alongside Volume
IBIT’s three-day call skew increased by 0.05 during the same period, according to the Goldman Sachs data. The move was more than three times the average three-day change since January 2025 and the largest increase in the available data over that period.
Call skew measures the relative pricing of upside options compared with downside options. A higher reading indicates traders were paying more for upside exposure, although call volume alone does not establish that every trade was an outright bullish bet because options can also be used for hedging and multi-leg strategies.
The Kobeissi Letter described the activity by saying that the investors are chasing the crypto rally. Its data summary also noted that IBIT calls exceeded one million contracts in each of the three sessions.
Bitcoin Rally Coincides With ETF Inflows
The options activity occurred as Bitcoin moved sharply higher, reaching about $79,455 on August 21. At the same time, U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded net inflows across August 19 through August 21, with IBIT accounting for approximately $1.03 billion of inflows during those three sessions.
BlackRock reported IBIT net assets of about $60.34 billion as of August 24, compared with $46.96 billion on August 14. The increase reflects both investor flows and changes in the value of Bitcoin held by the trust.
High Call Activity Does Not Guarantee Further Gains
Heavy call activity can increase market-maker hedging flows, depending on whether dealers are net long or short options and on the structure of individual trades. Public options data, however, do not establish whether that hedging contributed materially to Bitcoin’s latest rally.
The record call volume and higher call skew therefore point to a sharp increase in activity and stronger relative demand for IBIT options tied to upside exposure. They do not confirm where Bitcoin will trade next, and continued call pricing, ETF flows and Bitcoin’s price direction will indicate whether the positioning persists after the recent rally.
