A rise in Coinbase Prime trading volume on Oct. 18 offered no clear sign of buying pressure, while Bitcoin (BTC) remained cheaper on Coinbase than Binance a day later.
Coinbase Prime handled 2,960.04 BTC on Oct. 18, compared with 1,900.38 BTC on Oct. 17. The higher total shows more trading at the institutional venue, but it does not reveal whether purchases or sales accounted for the increase.
CryptoQuant’s Coinbase Premium Index was negative on Oct. 19. The metric uses Coinbase BTC/USD and Binance BTC/USDT prices; a reading below zero indicates that Bitcoin was priced lower on Coinbase in that comparison. Its Oct. 18 reading was -0.1329%.
The Oct. 19 result extends a Coinbase discount recorded on Oct. 17. The index measures a difference between spot prices, while Prime volume measures trading activity. Neither figure alone establishes the balance of institutional buying and selling.
A separate Coinbase spot order book snapshot on Oct. 19 showed $1.9011 million more sell interest than buy interest. Those were posted orders, rather than completed trades, and do not describe the direction of Coinbase Prime volume.
In the futures market, leveraged funds held 11,364 short CME bitcoin contracts and 5,520 long contracts as of Oct. 13, CFTC data showed. That earlier snapshot covers positions in a different market from the Oct. 19 Coinbase price comparison.
The CFTC’s next weekly positioning report is scheduled for Friday, Oct. 23, at 3:30 p.m. ET.
