Ethereum Classic: $105.8M OI Climbs 9.2% as Positioning Splits
Ethereum Classic is trading at $9.084 with open interest up 9.2% over 24 hours to roughly $105.8M, yet the positioning behind that expansion is not aligned. Account data shows 63.9% of traders long, while taker positioning is only 45.8% long, creating a clear split between passive exposure and aggressive execution. The supplied news mix combines ETC forecast coverage with unrelated Bitcoin-product and meme-coin presale stories, so the derivatives data offers the cleaner signal here.
OI is expanding unevenly
The exchange distribution points to concentration rather than a uniform build. Binance holds $29.0M, or 27.5% of total open interest, and its OI is up only 1.1% in 24 hours. Bybit carries $13.8M, or 13.1%, while slipping 0.1%. OKX has $8.2M, or 7.7%, with a 1.8% increase. Bitget controls $9.8M, or 9.3%, and has added 3.2%.
The sharpest change is at Gate, where $15.5M represents 14.6% of OI after a 56.0% daily jump. Its four-hour change is also 7.2%, unlike Binance, Bybit and Bitget, whose four-hour changes are negative. That makes Gate the clearest source of fresh leverage, while the largest venue is comparatively stable. The overall 9.2% OI increase therefore looks more like a venue-specific expansion layered onto an established base than a synchronized market-wide commitment.
Funding stays positive, but conviction varies
The average funding rate is 0.006528% for the 8-hour reading, consistent with a modest cost for longs. Most major venues show 0.01%, including Binance, OKX, Bybit, Bitget and Gate at 0.0011%. The spread is still meaningful: Coinbase is at 0.0205%, while Kraken is 0.003741% and Hyperliquid is 0.00125%. Bitfinex and CoinEx are at 0%, and Crypto.com is negative at -0.008%.
This dispersion weakens the argument for a fully crowded long trade. Positive funding across many venues says longs are paying, but the lowest and negative readings show that demand is not equally strong everywhere. The combination of rising OI and mixed funding is more consistent with positioning divergence than with a clean consensus trend.
Liquidations favor the short squeeze signal
The liquidation structure changed materially across windows. Over 24 hours, total liquidations reached $112.1K, with $67.5K from longs and $44.6K from shorts. Over 12 hours, however, shorts accounted for $35.4K against $6.1K for longs, producing $41.5K in total liquidations. The latest four-hour window was much smaller at $2.8K, with $2.1K from longs and $0.6K from shorts, while the one-hour window recorded no liquidations.
The 12-hour imbalance suggests that upward movement toward $9.084 forced more shorts out, even though the full-day total still contains more long liquidations. That matches the taker reading: aggressive traders are not yet predominantly long, while account-level exposure remains long-heavy. In other words, the market can continue higher through short covering without requiring a broad wave of fresh aggressive buying.
Verdict: The immediate signal is cautiously bullish but structurally fragile: price at $9.084 is supported by $105.8M of OI, positive average funding and a recent $35.4K of short liquidations over 12 hours. The positioning-divergence view is invalidated if ETC loses $9.084 while OI remains above $105.8M, because that would indicate expanding leverage is being absorbed on the downside rather than squeezed higher. Data as of 22:14 Beijing time on Oct 2, covering Binance, OKX, Bybit and other major venues.