Bitcoin has climbed back above $82,000 for the first time in over three months, yet derivatives markets are flashing a historically bullish signal. According to a new report from research and brokerage firm K33, the 30-day average funding rate for Bitcoin perpetual futures has been negative for 67 consecutive days — the longest such streak this decade.
K33 Head of Research Vetle Lunde highlighted that this persistent negative funding, which surpasses the previous record stretch from March 15 to May 16, 2020, reflects deeply defensive positioning among traders, even as the spot price trends higher. "Historically, sustained periods of negative funding have often occurred near market bottoms, suggesting that conditions like the current tend to have a positive directional impact on BTC," Lunde said.
The analysis examined every instance of consistently negative 30-day average funding rates since October 2018. The results show that buying Bitcoin during these regimes yields significantly better returns than random market entries. Over a 30-day to 360-day horizon, win rates for such entries ranged from 83% to 96%, compared to just 55% to 70% for random buying dates. Median and average returns outperformed random buying by multiples of 1.84x to 6.27x.
"This highlights that buying BTC in environments such as the current has a far more favorable skew to the upside than buying BTC randomly," Lunde noted. The data further shows that maximum drawdowns are lower and the average time spent underwater is shorter when entering during negative funding regimes. Lunde concluded that the pattern reflects genuine market sentiment embedded in actual trader costs, not a technical pattern, making the signal particularly robust. The findings have raised the risk of a short squeeze, as an unwinding of bearish derivatives bets could accelerate price gains.
