Bitcoin nears $72,000 as rising open interest signals growing leverage in choppy market

BTC rises with equities while surging open interest and fading volatility point to leveraged positioning despite repeated rejections near $72,000. What to know : Bitcoin is testing the $72,000 level again, but repeated rejections have led traders to build short positions, pushing futures open interest to a one-week high. Ether and a number of other altcoins are seeing stronger bullish positioning, with ETH open interest at multimonth highs and DeFi and AI tokens outperforming BTC. Declining implied volatility and weakening put skew suggest fading geopolitical risk concerns even as macro headlines remain in focus.