Quad-Witching's Back: Bitcoin's Annual 'Sideways Snooze' Into 'Painful Plunge' Pattern

Markets are gearing up for the quarterly quadruple witching event this Friday, a day when trillions in TradFi derivatives decide to collectively retire. This hallowed ritual—where stock index futures, stock index options, single-stock options, and single-stock futures all flatline in unison—typically unleashes a frenzy of trading and potential chaos as desk jockeys madly close, roll, or pray over their positions.

While the official scorecard for March 2026 isn't out yet, the numbers are always cartoonishly large. For a sense of scale, the March 2025 expiry saw roughly $4.7 trillion in notional value go poof. That session also proudly wore the crown for the highest S&P 500 trading volume of the entire year, a real badge of honor for volatility connoisseurs.

The event is crashing a party that's already plenty spicy. Oil recently kissed $120 per barrel, gold took a dip below $4,600, bitcoin briefly forgot the $69k support level, and the VIX fear gauge spiked above 35—hitting its most anxious level in a full trip around the sun.

Cole Kennelly, CEO of Volmex Finance, suggests this TradFi tantrum could splash into our crypto pool. "Quadruple witching could trigger a spike in cross-asset volatility as large derivatives positions expire," he noted, pointing to the rising Bitcoin Volmex Implied Volatility (BVIV) Index as Exhibit A.

So, what's bitcoin's historical performance during these witching hours? Picture a degén staring at a flat chart: the day itself is usually a profound snooze, but the aftermath is where the real action (read: pain) unfolds.

On March 21, 2025, BTC was only slightly red, but it decided to find its true bottom weeks later around $76,000. The June 20 expiry delivered a modest 1.5% decline, with a local low near $98,000 arriving fashionably late two days after. September 19 brought a drop over 1%, which was just the appetizer for a main course plunge from $177,000 to $108,000 the following week. December 19 actually finished roughly 3% higher at around $85,000, though it was still caught in a broader downtrend, like winning a battle but losing the war.

The consistent theme? Muted, borderline boring action on the actual expiry day, followed by remarkably consistent weakness in the days and weeks after. Call it the 'sideways sedative' before the volatility venom kicks in.

As if one expiry event wasn't enough entertainment, crypto has its own quarterly fireworks show scheduled for the following week. On March 27, a cool $13.5 billion in crypto derivatives are set to expire on Deribit, where the current positioning looks less like a strong directional bet and more like a whole lot of people hedging for pure, unadulterated chaos.