Sui Positioning Split: $856.2M OI, 72.8% Accounts Long, $1.18

Sui is trading at $1.1831 after a 3.6% daily decline, but the more important signal is the split beneath price: open interest stands at $856.2M after dropping 5.7% in 24 hours, while 72.8% of tracked accounts are still long. At the same time, long taker flow is only 44.9%, pointing to a market where account positioning remains bullish even as aggressive execution leans toward selling.

Recent market commentary has centered on Sui’s adoption narrative and conflicting technical expectations, but the derivatives tape offers a more immediate read: leverage is being reduced, and the remaining positioning is not aligned across venues or trader types.

OI is concentrated, but venue signals diverge

The largest open-interest block sits on Gate at $183.5M, or 21.4% of the tracked total, despite a 4.3% 24-hour decline. Binance follows with $153.8M and a 18.0% share, but its OI fell 7.0%, making it the sharpest reduction among the largest venues. Bybit carries $105.7M, or 12.4%, after a 2.8% decline, while Bitget contributes $69.5M and 8.1% after a more moderate 1.3% drop.

That is not a uniform deleveraging event. OKX holds only $46.0M, or 5.4%, yet its OI increased 2.9% over 24 hours and 2.9% over four hours. Bitget’s four-hour OI also rose 1.7%, and Gate increased 0.9% over the same window. The dominant venues are shedding exposure, while selected venues are rebuilding it, creating a positioning divergence rather than a clean directional reset.

Funding shows different costs for staying long

The funding rate landscape reinforces that fragmentation. The average 8-hour funding rate is 0.0177%, but current venue readings range from -0.001921% on OKX and -0.000705% on Kraken to 0.004186% on Bybit, 0.0055% on Gate, and 0.01% on Bitget. Aster is also at 0.01%, while Coinbase and CoinEx show much higher readings of 0.1165% and 0.194748%.

Positive funding on several venues means longs are paying to maintain exposure, yet the negative readings on OKX and Kraken show that the cost is not market-wide. This matters because the same long-heavy account profile can represent crowded conviction on one venue and relatively cheap hedging or short demand on another. The negative OKX funding is particularly notable alongside its rising OI: fresh positions are being added where the carry is not rewarding longs.

Accounts stay long as active flow turns defensive

The account-versus-taker split is the clearest positioning fault line. Across the ticker snapshot, 72.8% of accounts are long, but the taker reading is 44.9% long. Binance is the sharpest example: 69.9% of accounts are long, while only 28.0% of taker flow is long and 72.0% is short. Gate is less extreme, with 66.4% long accounts and 63.3% long taker flow.

This suggests many traders are holding or averaging existing longs while active orders are leaning against them. It is not automatically a bearish reversal signal, because aggressive selling can also represent profit-taking or hedging. However, when paired with falling OI on Binance, Bybit and Gate, it says the current decline is being met by position reduction rather than broad fresh long construction.

Long liquidations are already doing the damage

The liquidation structure favors the downside for existing longs. In the last hour, long liquidations reached $8.8K versus $1.7K shorts. Over four hours, the imbalance widened to $99.2K longs against $7.9K shorts. Over 24 hours, $1.4M in longs were liquidated compared with $454.8K shorts.

The 12-hour window briefly reverses that pattern, with $203.6K long liquidations and $324.4K shorts, showing that an earlier upside move did force some short covering. The largest recorded event was a $202.3K short liquidation at $1.2352 on Bybit, but the more recent meaningful levels are long liquidations at $1.1962 on OKX and $1.1729 and $1.1698 on Binance. The market has therefore moved from short pressure above price to long pressure below it.

Verdict: SUI’s near-term bias is fragile to bearish while price remains below $1.1962 and aggregate OI stays around $856.2M or lower, because account longs are not being confirmed by taker demand and long liquidations dominate the latest windows. The $1.1729-$1.1698 zone is the key downside stress area; a recovery through $1.1962 followed by a return toward $1.2352, with OI expanding rather than falling, would invalidate this defensive view.

Data as of 14:05 Beijing time on Oct 6, covering Binance, OKX, Bybit and other major venues.