Funding extremes: the most stretched perpetuals

The derivatives market is displaying a striking divergence in funding extremes, with eight tokens clustered at opposite ends of the leverage spectrum. Seven markets are deep in negative territory, meaning shorts are paying longs to hold their positions—a signal of overwhelming short accumulation. One stands alone in positive funding territory. This imbalance reveals fragmented positioning, with some markets grinding under extraordinary carry costs while others flash the opposite extreme.

Key takeaways

• B3 has collapsed into the deepest negative funding at -4649.95% annualized, with a funding percentile of 1 over the past 90 days, indicating shorts are heavily overextended relative to the coin's own recent history.
• BTW is the sole positive outlier at 404.59%, placing it at the 97 percentile, meaning longs are now paying shorts at rates historically rare for that token.
• Open interest across these eight tokens spans a wide range: BTW dominates at $62.6M, while B3 is minimal at $1.4M, yet B3's leverage risk score of 83 ranks it as the fragile market in this cohort.
• Most tokens show rising open interest over 24 hours, with KAT surging +106.0% and B3 explosive at +179.7%, suggesting fresh leverage is entering even as funding rates punish new positioning.

The short-side extreme: B3's historic carry burden

B3 represents funding at its most dislocated. At -4649.95% annualized, shorts are paying longs at a rate so steep it has essentially never occurred in the past 90 days—the funding percentile sits at 1. This is the floor of its recent range. The market is tiny at $1.4M open interest, but it surged +179.7% in 24 hours, meaning traders are actively adding exposure despite the punitive carry cost. The leverage risk score of 83 marks this as the most fragile positioning in the dataset, combining extreme funding stress with rapid deleveraging vulnerability. Such rates typically emerge when shorts are trapped and forced to bleed capital to stay in their position.

KAT and ALICE follow in similar distress, with -894.26% and -783.13% respectively, both at funding percentiles of 4 and 1—extreme relative to their own recent history. KAT's open interest jumped +106.0% in one day, RE at -719.30% sits at the 13 percentile, and even the milder SKL and PARTI are trading at -487.38% and -497.23%.

Negative funding at -4649.95% means shorts collectively bleed capital daily to hold their bets—an unsustainable structural position.

The breadth of short crowding

Six of the eight tokens trade in negative funding territory, but the depth varies sharply. RE, the second-largest market in this group at $43.3M open interest, carries funding of -719.30% yet sits at only the 13 percentile of its 90-day range—meaning this rate, while extreme in absolute terms, is not historically unusual for RE. Its liquidation imbalance of -0.62 suggests shorts are being cleared, not longs. HOME, at $12.9M and -602.85% funding, is noteworthy for being at the 31 percentile, indicating its carry cost has moderated relative to recent extremes, and its open interest actually fell -3.9% in 24 hours as some shorts unwind.

The pattern suggests differential stress: tokens like B3 and ALICE are in acute crisis (funding percentiles of 1), while RE and HOME show shorts grinding but with some relief from recent peaks. PARTI presents a rare case: it has the lowest funding percentile at 0, yet its open interest grew +17.6% and liquidation imbalance hit -1.00, meaning only shorts were liquidated—this is typically a signal that short positions are being forced to close or collapse rather than rationally exiting.

The outlier: BTW's crowded long

BTW breaks the pattern entirely. At 404.59% annualized funding and a 97 percentile, longs are now paying shorts—a reversal of the short dominance seen elsewhere. The market is substantial at $62.6M open interest, though it contracted -2.0% in 24 hours. The funding percentile of 97 means this positive rate is at the extreme high end of BTW's recent range, suggesting longs have accumulated aggressively and are now bearing the weight of carry costs. The leverage risk score of 49 is moderate, indicating less fragility than the short-crushed markets, but the extremity of the rate still signals crowding, just on the opposite side.

What would change this read

The most immediate invalidation signal would be normalization of funding rates themselves—if B3's rate moved up from -4649.95% or if BTW's fell from 404.59%, it would suggest the underlying imbalances are correcting. A reversal of the open interest trend, with these tokens rolling over their gains (e.g., B3's +179.7% reversing into negative territory), would indicate leverage is being shed rather than added. Finally, a rebalancing in liquidation imbalances—if longs began liquidating in the short-heavy markets instead of shorts, or vice versa in BTW—would signal mechanical exhaustion in the crowded side. Monitoring whether 7-day open interest data (currently n/a) emerges showing sustained builds or rolls would provide critical confirmation of whether this positioning is sticky or transient.

*Analysis generated from Quantority's live cross-exchange data pipeline. Descriptive market data, not a trade recommendation.*