Weekly Preview | Approximately $23 billion worth of Bitcoin options will expire on December 26; Aster launches its fifth phase airdrop.

Breaking News Preview:

• Aster will launch its fifth phase of airdrops on December 22, distributing 1.2% of the total supply.
• MetaPlanet will hold an extraordinary general meeting on December 22 to discuss important proposals regarding the future issuance of preferred shares;
• The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis will release third-quarter GDP data on December 23.
• Due to the US Christmas holiday, US stock markets will be closed on Wednesday, December 25.
• Plasma (XPL) will unlock approximately 88.89 million tokens at 8 PM Beijing time on December 25th, representing 4.5% of the circulating supply, worth approximately $11.7 million.
• Approximately $23 billion worth of Bitcoin options will expire on December 26, potentially exacerbating already high volatility.

December 22

Project Updates:

Binance Wallet will launch the Bitway (BTW) Pre-TGE and airdrop incentive program on December 22.

According to Binance Wallet, Bitway ($BTW) will launch a Pre-TGE subscription and Booster Program airdrop event on Binance Wallet on December 22nd, with a total of 300 million BTW tokens (3% of the total supply) allocated for multi-stage task rewards. Participants must hold Binance Alpha points, and the rewards will have a lock-up period. The Pre-TGE phase allows users to subscribe to BTW with BNB, with a limit of 3 BNB per user. The tokens are not immediately tradable; specific release and unlocking times will be announced by the project team.

Aster will launch its fifth phase of airdrops on December 22nd, allocating 1.2% of the total supply.

Aster announced on the X platform that on December 22, Aster will enter the fifth phase of its airdrop, named "Crystal." This phase marks the lowest emission airdrop to date. The fifth phase will last for 6 weeks (December 22, 2025 to February 1, 2026), with an allocation ratio of 1.2% of the total supply (approximately 96 million ASTER), and an optional 3-month vesting period.

MetaPlanet's extraordinary general meeting will be held on December 22, with the preferred stock issuance proposal pending review.

Simon Gerovich, a director of the Japanese listed company MetaPlanet, announced that MetaPlanet will hold an extraordinary general meeting of shareholders on Monday, December 22, 2025, to discuss an important resolution regarding the future issuance of preferred shares, which will have a key impact on the company's medium- and long-term strategy. Shareholders can exercise their voting rights through an online platform, with the deadline for exercising these rights being 18:00 (Japan time) on Friday, December 19.

Espresso will open airdrop registration on December 22nd, covering millions of addresses.

The blockchain infrastructure platform Espresso will open airdrop registration on December 22nd, covering millions of addresses. To date, the official team has released 22 eligibility paths for the airdrop. These include Espresso hackathon participants, Caffeinated creators, POAP holders from online and offline events, and users of partner blockchains (ApeChain, RARI Chain, Arbitrum, Celo, etc.).

In addition, the official team will launch the second round of Bantr activities. Bantr will continue to track Espresso-related attention and on-chain activity in the English, Korean, and Chinese leaderboards, with a particular focus on the period after December 1st. The top 100 participants across the three leaderboards will share a mysterious allocation of ESP tokens, which can be claimed after TGE (the launch date of the claim portal has not yet been announced).

Token unlocking:

MBG By Multibank Group (MBG) will unlock approximately 15.84 million tokens at 8 PM Beijing time on December 22nd, representing 8.42% of the circulating supply, with a value of approximately $8.1 million.

December 23

Macroeconomics:

The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis will release third-quarter GDP data on December 23.

According to Jinshi News, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis will release the U.S. third-quarter GDP data on December 23.

Exchange:

Binance will remove several leveraged trading pairs, including DOT/FDUSD and ENA/FDUSD, on December 23.

According to an official announcement, Binance Leverage will remove the following leveraged trading pairs on December 23, 2025 at 14:00 (UTC+8):

Full margin trading pairs: DOT/FDUSD, ENA/FDUSD, SEI/FDUSD, FIL/FDUSD, BONK/FDUSD, ZK/FDUSD, ETC/FDUSD, WLD/FDUSD, OP/FDUSD, NEAR/FDUSD, WIF/FDUSD, APT/FDUSD, DYDX/FDUSD, TIA/FDUSD, UNI/FDUSD

Isolated margin trading pairs: DOT/FDUSD, ENA/FDUSD, SEI/FDUSD, FIL/FDUSD, BONK/FDUSD, ZK/FDUSD, ETC/FDUSD, WLD/FDUSD, OP/FDUSD, NEAR/FDUSD, WIF/FDUSD, DYDX/FDUSD, TIA/FDUSD

Token unlocking:

SOON will unlock approximately 21.88 million tokens at 4:30 PM Beijing time on December 23, representing 5.97% of the circulating supply, with a value of approximately $8 million.

Undeads Games (UDS) will unlock approximately 2.15 million tokens at 8:00 AM Beijing time on December 23rd, representing 1.46% of the circulating supply, worth approximately $5.2 million.

December 24

Exchange:

The US stock market will open as scheduled on December 24 and 26.

December 25th (Wednesday) is a Christmas holiday in the United States, and the US stock market will be closed for the day. Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange stated that the US stock market will open as scheduled on December 24th and December 26th. This comes after Trump signed an executive order announcing that the federal government will be shut down on December 24th and 26th, around Christmas time.

December 25

Project Updates:

Irys: The deadline for claiming the IRYS token airdrop is December 25th.

Irys, a programmable data chain, announced on the Galxe platform that the IRYS token airdrop application link is now live. The application period is from 20:00 Beijing time on November 25th to 20:00 on December 25th, with a snapshot time of November 11th. Furthermore, Irys stated that the top 10,000 participants on Galxe will receive the airdrop; all Genesis NFT holders who have previously registered for the airdrop are eligible.

The decentralized AI computing protocol gensyn will announce token distribution details on December 25th.

The decentralized AI computing protocol Gensyn completed its token public sale on December 21st, attracting 7,412 participants who invested approximately $16.14 million. The FDV at the time of the public sale was $473 million, and the token price was $0.0473. The Gensyn Foundation stated that details regarding token distribution will be announced on December 25th.

Governance Voting:

Uniswap submitted a UNIFICation proposal: planning to destroy 100 million UNI tokens; voting ends on December 25th.

Uniswap founder Hayden Adams announced that the UNInformation proposal has been submitted for a final governance vote. Voting will begin at 11:30 AM Beijing time on December 20th and end on December 25th. If the proposal passes, after a two-day lock-up period, Uniswap Labs will burn 100 million UNI tokens and enable the v2 and v3 fee on/off mechanism on the Ethereum mainnet, beginning the burning of UNI and Unichain fees.

In addition, the proposal includes a Protocol Fee Discount Auction (PFDA) mechanism to optimize liquidity provider (LP) returns, the use of aggregator pegging functionality to expand Uniswap v4, migrating and permanently locking Unisocks liquidity, and integrating the Uniswap Foundation's ecosystem support team into Uniswap Labs. The proposal also plans to establish an annual growth budget of 20 million UNI for protocol development and ecosystem expansion.

Token unlocking:

Humanity (H) will unlock approximately 105 million tokens at 8:00 AM Beijing time on December 25th, representing 4.79% of the circulating supply, worth approximately $14.8 million.

Plasma (XPL) will unlock approximately 88.89 million tokens at 8 PM Beijing time on December 25th, representing 4.5% of the circulating supply, worth approximately $11.7 million.

December 26

Macroeconomics:

Approximately $23 billion worth of Bitcoin options will expire on December 26, potentially exacerbating already high volatility.

According to Bloomberg, the options market shows that Bitcoin is under significant pressure as we enter the final weeks of 2025, with approximately $23 billion worth of contracts expiring next Friday, potentially exacerbating already high volatility. This amount represents more than half of all open interest on the Deribit platform. Nick Forster, founder of Derive.xyz, stated, “Bitcoin positioning remains clearly bearish. 30-day volatility has rebounded to around 45%, while skewness hovers around -5%. Longer-term skewness is also anchored around -5%, indicating that traders are pricing in continued downside risk for the first and second quarters due to persistent selling pressure from previously inactive wallets weighing on spot prices.”

Positioning around the December 26th contract expiry date reflects this divergence. Call options are concentrated at strike prices of $100,000 and $120,000, suggesting continued market optimism about a year-end rebound. However, put options have dominated recently, accumulating significant put exposure at a strike price of $85,000. Furthermore, traders anticipate a market repositioning around two catalysts: hedging ahead of the January 15th MSCI decision, which may remove companies with more than 50% of their assets in crypto assets from its index; and a resurgence of call-overwriting flows.

Project Updates:

The "MEET48 2026 AI Entertainment UGC Platform and Web3.0 Development Strategy Launch Conference" will be held in Seoul on December 26th.

On December 26, 2025, from 1:30 PM to 6:00 PM, MEET48, the world's first idol fan economy ecosystem based on Web3 and deeply integrating AI and UGC, will jointly host the "MEET48 2026 AI Entertainment UGC Platform and Web3.0 Development Strategy Launch Conference " in Seoul, South Korea. This event will be held in collaboration with AIGC digital content creator L1 ecosystem chain POChain, AuditionsGO (an AIUGC virtual idol music and dance simulation game developed by the original operation and marketing team of "Audition"), Hash Global, Web3 Entertainment Alliance, and The Fan.

December 27

Governance Voting:

The LayerZero community will complete its third fee on/off vote on December 27th.

LayerZero stated in its official blog that holders will participate in the third fee switch vote at 8:00 AM Beijing time on December 20th. This vote, held every six months, aims to allow holders to decide whether to activate the protocol's fee switch. If the vote passes, protocol fees will be used to buy back and burn ZRO.

The voting period is from 8:00 AM Beijing time on December 20th to 8:00 AM Beijing time on December 27th. A quorum of 40.59% of the circulating ZRO, or 230 million ZRO, is required to vote. For the quorum to be valid, more than 50% of the votes must be in favor. LayerZeroLabs, the LayerZero Foundation, and related parties will abstain.