Why U.S. Buyers Are Propping Up Bitcoin While International ‘Smart Money’ Takes Profit

Bitcoin’s latest reaction to geopolitical shock has exposed a growing fault line in its market structure: U.S. trading hours are increasingly driving upside, while Asia-led flows — long associated with “smart money” accumulation — are more often where profit-taking shows up.

Following U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, Bitcoin again served as a 24/7 risk barometer, but this time the strongest bid emerged when U.S. cash and derivatives markets reopened. That shift matters for traders trying to read who is really buying, who is selling, and when those flows are most likely to appear.

The weekend shock: conflict headlines meet thin liquidity

The latest selloff-and-rebound sequence began over the weekend as news of the strikes hit during one of Bitcoin’s structurally thinnest liquidity windows. Price plunged to a low near $63,254 on Saturday before grinding higher above $67,000 and settling back into the mid-$65,000s ahead of Monday’s U.S. open.

Cross-asset positioning largely followed an established pattern for major geopolitical escalations. Brent crude oil jumped into the low-$80s as markets priced disruption risk in energy channels, while U.S. equity futures slid, reflecting broader risk-off sentiment. In traditional macro hedging, capital rotated toward gold and the U.S. dollar rather than into long-duration bonds, amid concern that elevated energy prices could fuel inflation or even stagflation.

Bitcoin, meanwhile, behaved less like a classic “digital gold” haven and more like a 24/7 expression of short-term fear and hedging. Historically, conflict-driven shocks have not produced consistent safe-haven behavior in BTC. Instead, crypto’s round-the-clock liquidity turns it into a venue where traders can quickly express risk views when other major markets are closed, then often reverse or adjust those positions once traditional venues reopen.

This weekend fit that template: a fast air pocket down on headlines, followed by a partial reset before Monday. But the follow-through during U.S. hours diverged from previous episodes, with BTC emerging as one of the few risk-on assets to rally into the U.S. cash open despite the broader macro stress.

From weekend panic to weekday repricing

The pattern since the strikes can be described as “weekend shock, weekday repricing.” The shock phase coincides with thinned-out liquidity and limited participation from U.S. spot ETF desks. That absence of ETF-driven demand leaves price more exposed to abrupt moves as traders react to headlines with fewer offsetting flows.

The repricing phase arrives when U.S. markets reopen and capital can move through the channels that have become systemically important since spot Bitcoin ETFs launched. The recent run of flows into those ETFs underlines why weekday price action has diverged from the weekend.

Data from the main U.S. spot BTC ETFs over late February and early March show a swing from notable outflows into sustained inflows:

• Feb. 23: -$203.8 million (outflow)
• Feb. 24: +$257.7 million (inflow)
• Feb. 25: +$506.6 million (inflow)
• Feb. 26: +$254.4 million (inflow)
• Mar. 2: +$458.2 million (inflow)

Across those sessions, net ETF flows total roughly +$1.27 billion. That size is enough to materially influence how the market “audits” the weekend move once U.S.-linked liquidity comes back online. A weekend dip thus becomes the first tradable release valve, while Monday turns into the moment where larger pools of capital express views via ETF creations, macro hedges, and cash markets.

It would be misleading to label every Monday bounce as purely “ETF-driven.” Rather, Monday is when multiple U.S. flow channels are open simultaneously: spot ETF demand, CME futures positioning, and correlations with equities and rates. When these align on the buy side, price often moves in straighter lines than during illiquid weekend sessions.

How U.S. hours became Bitcoin’s ‘decision session’

Bitcoin still trades 24/7, but returns are no longer evenly distributed across global trading sessions. Research cited in the original analysis notes that over the period from January 2023 to December 2025, U.S. session returns exceeded those in Asia-Pacific (APAC) and London. That marks a shift for a market that historically leaned on offshore venues and Asia-centric liquidity.

In previous cycles, studies breaking down BTC performance by region often found APAC hours contributing disproportionately to net upside, with U.S. sessions more likely to coincide with drawdowns or macro-style selling. In that regime, Asian hours looked like the stealth accumulation window, while U.S. hours acted as volatility and risk-off windows.

Asia has never been a monolith: Japan, offshore dollar venues, and individual retail-driven pockets such as South Korea have played distinct roles in price discovery and short-term distortions. Still, the broader pattern of an “Asia bid” and a more cautious U.S. tape was identifiable across multiple regimes.

The current session overlays flip that narrative. The strongest recent impulsive rally — a sharp vertical move into the ~$70,000 region — occurred during a U.S. session. In contrast, the latest meaningful downdrift from the high-$68,000s/$69,000 area down toward roughly $66,500 was concentrated during Asia hours, signaling more consistent selling or profit-taking out of that region.

European hours, by comparison, appear more transitional — often extending the trend set by either Asia or the U.S. rather than decisively reversing it. Taken together, the session data point to U.S. trading hours becoming Bitcoin’s effective “decision session,” where net direction for the week is increasingly set.

Why U.S. buyers are stepping in as Asia sells

The divergence between U.S. buying and Asia-led profit-taking is rooted in how flows from ETFs and derivatives now interact during the workweek.

U.S. hours blend three critical components:

• Spot ETF demand: Net creations push spot demand through regulated products that have become a preferred access point for many institutional and wealth-management channels.
• CME futures and basis trading: Professional desks respond to ETF-driven spot moves by adjusting hedges and basis trades, linking futures markets tightly to ETF and spot activity.
• Macro overlay: The same desks trading equities, rates, and FX often use Bitcoin as another risk expression because it trades nearly around the clock and reacts quickly to shifts in broader sentiment.

Recent derivatives data suggest that leverage is not aggressively chasing higher prices. A CryptoQuant research note cited in the article indicates CME basis compression and a roughly 47% decline in CME Bitcoin futures open interest from its peak — signs of a leverage reset.

A cleaner derivatives backdrop reduces the likelihood of forced liquidations driving exaggerated moves, but it also means fewer marginal leveraged buyers ready to extend rallies on their own. That puts more weight on spot demand — including ETF buying — to sustain any breakouts.

By contrast, Asia’s role in this setup currently appears more skewed toward distribution. The session data show heavier sell-side drift during APAC hours, which lines up with a picture of international participants locking in gains after the U.S. has pushed price higher. That behavior doesn’t necessarily mean Asian traders are universally bearish; it does underscore that the incremental, trend-driving bid is now more U.S.-centric.

One potential structural change on the horizon is CME’s plan to launch 24/7 crypto derivatives trading in late May. If implemented, this would blur the current “Sunday reopen” dynamic and may reduce the size of thin-liquidity weekend air pockets by allowing more institutional participants to respond in real time. It will not eliminate geopolitical volatility, but it could redistribute who has the capacity to act during weekend shocks and narrow the gap between weekend and weekday repricing.

What options markets are saying about the next month

Options markets are already pricing a wide distribution of potential outcomes for Bitcoin over the next several weeks. Deribit’s DVOL index, referenced in the analysis, was around 53, with Deribit’s own data placing the implied volatility (IV) percentile near 91.8 versus the past year. That’s elevated, indicating that traders expect larger-than-normal swings.

With spot near $66,500, a DVOL reading of roughly 53% annualized translates — under standard volatility math — into an implied one-standard-deviation move of about:

• ±7.3% over one week, or roughly ±$4,900, implying a range near $61,600 to $71,400
• ±15% over 30 days, or roughly ±$10,100, implying a range near $56,000 to $77,000

Those probabilistic bands broadly match the technical map traders are using to frame scenarios:

• Resistance zones:
  • ~$69,000–$70,700: the breakout/failed-breakout band where sustained acceptance could force spot chasing.
  • ~$71,500–$72,000: the next supply region if price can hold above ~$70,700.
• Support shelves:
  • Mid-$65,000s: the first meaningful support; losing it often turns bounces into retests.
  • ~$64,600 / ~$63,800: prior reaction areas near the weekend shock region.
• Deeper downside markers:
  • ~$61,700 and ~$61,100: structural levels that may come into play if broader macro stress persists.

These are not certainties but reference points. Options markets are effectively saying that a move into either the higher resistance zones or lower support bands over the next month would be statistically normal given current volatility pricing.

Key data to watch as the U.S.–Asia split widens

Macro remains the overarching driver around this setup, with energy as the main wildcard. If the conflict narrative keeps oil elevated, market focus tends to shift toward inflation risk, pressuring equities and influencing rates. Historically, that is the regime where Bitcoin often trades less as a safe haven and more as a high-beta expression of liquidity and risk appetite.

For traders trying to navigate the growing divide between U.S. buyers and international profit-takers, three observable inputs stand out:

• U.S. spot ETF flows: Do daily flows keep printing net inflows, or does a multi-day outflow streak emerge? Sustained inflows support the idea that U.S. hours will continue to be the primary bid.
• Deribit DVOL and implied volatility: Does DVOL cool from elevated levels or remain pinned near the top of its one-year range? High vol with weak spot demand often tilts toward choppy downside rather than clean upside trends.
• CME leverage and open interest: Does futures open interest rebuild after the reported drawdown, and if so, is that leverage net long or hedging existing exposure? A rebuilding leverage base can amplify whichever direction spot and ETF flows are pushing.

If these indicators lean supportive — steady ETF inflows, easing volatility, and stable or constructive basis — weekend dips are more likely to be bought aggressively once U.S. hours reopen, and resistance around $69,000–$70,700 has a higher chance of turning into an accepted trading zone rather than persistent overhead supply.

If they lean the other way — ETF outflows, stubbornly elevated vol, and stressed risk markets — price action could resemble the initial shock phase more often: sharp wicks on news, followed by slower, more systematic selling as weekday liquidity reprices the move.

The structural milestone to watch is late May, when CME’s planned move toward 24/7 crypto derivatives trading could soften, but not erase, the weekend shock/weekday repricing pattern. Until then, the deepest pools of U.S.-linked liquidity are still largely deciding their positioning when the traditional workweek begins — and, for now, that is where the marginal Bitcoin buyer appears most willing to step in while international participants keep taking profit.