Southeast Asia (SEA) has emerged as a leader in cryptocurrency adoption, with countries like Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines ranking among the top ten globally in the 2024 Chainalysis Global Crypto Adoption Index. T

Southeast Asia (SEA) has emerged as a leader in cryptocurrency adoption, with countries like Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines ranking among the top ten globally in the 2024 Chainalysis Global Crypto Adoption Index. The region has witnessed a remarkable surge in crypto ownership, increasing by 21.8% to 326.8 million users as reported by Triple-A's 2024 research. A young, tech-savvy population, significant underbanked demographics, and widespread internet access largely drive this growth.

In terms of ownership rates, Singapore leads with 24.4%, followed by Thailand (17.6%), Vietnam (17.4%), and Malaysia (14.3%). These statistics highlight the potential for further growth in a market characterized by innovation and an appetite for financial technology.

Despite the strong adoption of cryptocurrencies, Southeast Asian countries exhibit varied regulatory landscapes, reflecting their unique economic priorities and goals for innovation. Countries such as Singapore and Thailand have established comprehensive regulatory frameworks, while others like Vietnam are still in the early stages of policy development.

The regulatory approaches in SEA are fragmented, ranging from supportive to developing. For instance, Singapore has enacted significant legislation through the Payment Services Act and the Securities and Futures Act, creating a robust legal infrastructure for digital assets. Conversely, Vietnam is still formulating formal regulations despite its high adoption rates, and the Philippines is working towards establishing licensing rules for crypto service providers.

There is a growing trend towards aligning local regulations with international standards, particularly concerning anti-money laundering (AML) and tax transparency. Countries like Singapore and Thailand have implemented strict AML requirements for crypto exchanges, while Malaysia is enhancing tax reporting for crypto transactions. These measures aim to create a sustainable crypto environment while addressing financial crime risks.

Investor protection and regulatory maturity

Investor protection is increasingly a focus for nations with established regulatory frameworks. Singapore and Thailand are moving towards more robust regulations to safeguard investors, while other countries are still developing basic compliance mechanisms. This disparity in regulatory maturity can impact the overall investment climate and innovation potential within the region.

As Southeast Asia continues to evolve as a significant player in the global crypto landscape, several challenges and opportunities lie ahead. The region's success will depend on its ability to foster innovation while ensuring consumer protection and attracting investment.

Regulatory clarity is crucial for spurring growth in the crypto sector. Countries like Singapore have set high benchmarks with their established frameworks, which could serve as models for others in the region. Collaboration with industry players, such as Bybit's involvement in Vietnam's regulatory sandbox initiative, will be vital for crafting effective regulations that balance market risks with long-term growth objectives.

Aligning with global standards, such as the EU’s Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) guidelines, can enhance the credibility of SEA's crypto framework. This alignment will facilitate cross-border transactions and improve the region’s appeal to investors and businesses.

To capitalize on the growing interest in crypto, SEA must focus on building a supportive ecosystem that nurtures innovation. This includes investing in education, enhancing technological infrastructure, and promoting a collaborative environment among stakeholders. By fostering a culture of innovation and ensuring robust regulatory practices, SEA can solidify its position as a crypto powerhouse.

Southeast Asia stands at a pivotal moment in its crypto journey, characterized by significant adoption rates and a diverse regulatory landscape. The region's ability to establish clear, supportive regulations while fostering innovation will determine its future as a leading hub for cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. As countries navigate their regulatory paths, strategic collaboration and alignment with global standards will be essential to harness the full potential of the crypto market in Southeast Asia.

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Diving into Southeast Asia’s crypto regulatory landscape

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Bybit Crypto Insights Report: Diving into Southeast Asia’s crypto regulatory landscape

Our weekly crypto derivatives analytics report delves into macro events; the current state of crypto and trading signals from spot trading volume; and futures, options and perpetual contracts.

Front-end volatility for BTC has reacted to recent spot price fluctuations, leading to a new all-time high (ATH) of $111.8K, the first since January 20, 2025. At-the-money implied volatility is between 45% and 50%, with short-tenor volatility rising from last week's lows. Perpetual funding rates remain stable, even as spot prices climb, though options skew steepened towards calls by 7% due to increased demand for OTM calls.

In perpetual swaps, open interest hit a new May high over $11B, reflecting stronger risk-on sentiment than in April. For ETH, short-tenor options retain their volatility premium compared to longer-tenor options, while OTM calls continue to show solid support, despite a slowdown in the recent surge of ETH’s spot price.

Please check out the report’s highlights.

ETH open interest has started to rise this week, aligning with BTC surpassing its January ATH of $111K, positively affecting the crypto market, including Ether (+4.5%). However, the increase is slower than last week’s 50% surge in ETH's spot price. Total open interest and perpetual trading volume across nine tokens reached monthly highs of over $11B and $26B, respectively. On May 19, 2025, perpetual trading volumes surpassed $20B after Moody's downgraded US debt. BTC, like risk-on US equities, initially fell but quickly recovered its intraday losses.

Regulatory advances propel BTC toward ATH with put-call skews favouring calls

Mid-May volatility expectations declined as BTC traded sideways between $102K and $104K. Recently, this range extended to $108K due to a tariff détente between the US and China, though macro uncertainties like the downgrade of US treasuries limited a full breakout. However, regulatory advances helped BTC surpass $110K. This tug-of-war has led to reactive front-end volatility, with implied volatility levels for BTC between 45% and 50%. Options volumes remain skewed toward puts, despite the spot price entering price discovery, with open interest also dominated by puts at $200M.

What’s more, the skew of BTC volatility smiles has steepened significantly, as OTM calls trade at a higher implied volatility compared to puts across all tenors, with the one-week tenor put-call skew briefly exceeding 7% before coming back down.

ETH outperformance moderates as skews turn less bullish

After two weeks of ETH outperformance, it now lags behind BTC. While ETH's one-month returns are an impressive 69%, its seven-day increase has been lower, largely due to BTC's recent rally. The inversion in its term structure of volatility persists, with short tenors holding a premium over longer tenors. ETH's put-call skew is now significantly less bullish than last week, though it still shows a 5% skew for OTM calls. The dominance of call options in volumes and open interest has narrowed, with open interest in calls only $30M greater than in puts.

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Bybit X Block Scholes crypto derivatives analytics report (May 22, 2025): Bitcoin options skew steepens toward calls by 7%; ETH outperformances moderate

Discover how trading strategies differ in crypto vs. stock markets, from volatility and profit potential to regulation, TA tools, and trading hours.

 markets both offer profit opportunities to skilled traders but have significantly different characteristics. Compared to equities, cryptocurrencies are much more volatile and less regulated. They have lower barriers to entry and attract traders following 

The differences between the two asset classes mean they require different mindsets, approaches and tools to succeed. Strategies that work perfectly in the stock market may not fit the crypto market or require significant adjustments.

In this article, we will examine the key differences between stocks and cryptos. Understanding and appreciating these differences is key to successful trading in both markets.

Equities are a highly regulated asset class. Traders know that their funds are well protected by securities laws. They can diversify their stock portfolios, mixing in other regulated asset classes. The regulatory recognition also lets traders pursue tax-efficient investment strategies.

Crypto trading, on the other hand, has very low levels of regulation. This opens up opportunities for income sources that aren’t available for traditional asset classes 

The abundance of centralized (CEX) and decentralized (DEX) crypto exchanges and their rate differences also provide 

Skilled crypto traders may also use derivatives products, particularly 

 contracts. These are often based on pairing their target cryptocurrency with an established stablecoin, such as 

 (USDC). By holding the perp contracts with no expiry dates, the traders try to capitalize on the coin’s price movements against the stablecoin without owning that crypto directly. The perp contracts also typically offer the most liberal leverage ratios available in the crypto market.

Stock market trading hours are limited to Monday through Friday, 9:30 AM to 4:00 PM. Most stock exchanges in the US, including the two largest ones — the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and the NASDAQ — follow these hours.

These strictly defined hours have given rise to different occurrences, including market-opening momentum. This is where there’s a readily observable spike in activity in the first minutes of the trading day, typically driven by overnight news and pre-market events.

Another is the power hour, the last hour of trading, when traders rush to implement market moves they’re determined to carry out before the close of trading.

Unlike the stock market, the crypto market is open 24/7. The hour-specific phenomena of equities trading rarely apply to cryptocurrencies. Instead, the crypto market’s around-the-clock nature has led to the active use of automated trading strategies that can be executed at certain intervals regardless of the time of day.

 levels than cryptocurrencies. This is particularly true for blue-chip equities in stable, long-established industries like banking or utilities. Examples include JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) and Dominion Energy (D). Even tech and growth-oriented stocks like Microsoft (MSFT) and Apple (AAPL) exhibit lower volatility than crypto since they are global industry leaders with more established fundamentals.

The market’s relatively low volatility has led to the dominance of strategies like value-based investing and long-term trend following.

In contrast, the crypto market’s much higher volatility levels have led to the active use of momentum-based strategies and scalping, which aim to take advantage of small price changes quickly.

Crypto’s higher volatility attracts traders who utilize high-risk and high-reward strategies.

 This is particularly the case with smaller-cap altcoins as opposed to larger, more established cryptocurrencies like 

The stock market’s lower volatility also spells lower profit potential in the short term compared to crypto. Naturally, this is accompanied by less risk.

Instead of chasing large profits quickly, traders in the market try to maximize gains via long-term strategies, taking into account not only price growth but also dividend potential and other factors not directly tied to the stock price.

 (DCA), dividend-based investment, and long-term value investing are widespread in equities.

In contrast, the crypto market offers higher potential profits coupled with higher risks. High-risk strategies, such as leverage trading, short-term trend chasing and speculative altcoin investing, are very popular in the market. Not many active crypto traders, die-hard 

 aside, want to follow multi-month or multi-year approaches, which are very common in the stock market.   

As a result, you can earn significantly higher profits in crypto. However, the market also has an abundance of horror stories in which traders lose everything, or at least a significant proportion of their capital, trying to apply high-risk strategies.

 (TA) tools have a long and established history of use in the stock market. Equity traders use TA indicators like support and resistance levels, 

 and many others to support their decision-making. They also use fundamental analysis data pieces 

such as company earnings reports, price-to-earnings ratios, debt-to-equity ratios, dividend yield estimates and sectoral growth reports 

In the crypto market, many standard TA tools work reasonably well for high-cap, high-liquidity coins like Bitcoin and Ethereum. For these assets, support and resistance levels, volume data and basic patterns can provide useful information to support the trader’s actions. 

However, many TA indicators become less reliable the lower the liquidity of the analyzed coin. For low-liquidity altcoins, these indicators might become useless or even deceptive.

The most basic trading instrument in the equities market is the actual stock of publicly traded companies. Additionally, traders can invest in 

 (ETFs) that provide exposure to equities, bonds, indices, commodities, cryptocurrencies and other asset classes. In many cases, ETFs are based on a basket of assets, though single-asset ETFs are also quite common.

Stock traders also often invest in bonds, usually through the over-the-counter (OTC) bond market. Those with an understanding of the derivatives market may also trade options, futures or contracts for difference (CFDs) on specialized derivatives exchanges.

Typical trading instruments are somewhat different in the crypto market, where the most popular form of trading activity is the spot buying and selling of cryptocurrencies.

Skilled crypto traders may also use derivatives products, particularly perpetual futures contracts. These are often based on a pairing of their target cryptocurrency with some established stablecoin, such as USDT or USDC. By holding the perp contracts with no expiry dates, the traders try to capitalize on the coin’s price movements against the stablecoin without having to own that crypto directly. The perp contracts also typically offer the most liberal leverage ratios available in the crypto market.

There are considerable differences between equities and crypto, meaning trading these asset classes requires different approaches. Crypto’s 24/7 markets mean that many of the time-of-the-day phenomena observable in the stock market, such as the opening momentum and the rush hour, do not apply.

At the same time, the crypto market’s high volatility also means that traders actively use scalping and momentum-based strategies. The high volatility also attracts the trader crowd that prefers to apply high-risk and high-reward strategies. While risks in the market are considerably higher than for equities, potential profits, especially in the short term, can be significantly stronger.

Cryptocurrency traders should also consider that established TA methods may not provide as clear signals as they do in the stock market, particularly for smaller-cap coins. The prevalent trading instruments differ to some extent as well 

 spot cryptocurrency trades and perps dominate in the crypto market, while stocks and ETFs are the name of the game for equity traders.

Intermediate

trading difference between crypto and stocks

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Stock market vs. crypto: Different approaches to trading success

Mantle has partnered with Republic Technologies to make mETH the first liquid staking token held on the balance sheet of a publicly listed company.

The S&P 500 slipped 0.04% as deficit concerns from a $4T spending bill and a U.S. credit downgrade pressured markets. Gold fell 0.83% to $3,289 as a stronger US Dollar and solid US data outweighed falling yields, though long-term bullish sentiment remains supported by geopolitical risks. The Coindesk Indices, which tracks the broader crypto market, rose 2.13%, with Bitcoin and Ether up 2.35% and 5.37%, respectively in the past 24 hours. Trade these markets and more with up to 500x leverage on Bybit MT5 using this 

Today’s top performer is WLD, up 28.0% after Worldcoin raised $135M to scale its network, with verified users surpassing 12.5 million.

Worldcoin (WLD), uses iris scans to verify identity, giving users a World ID and free tokens. Co-founded by Sam Altman, it aims to build a global identity and financial network. Worldcoin 

 $135M through a direct token purchase by a16z and Bain Capital Crypto to scale its network, now with over 26M users and 12.5M verified via the Orb. The funding increased WLD's circulating supply.

Check out the latest prices, charts, and data of 

 with Republic Technologies to make mETH the first liquid staking token held on the balance sheet of a publicly listed company. Republic will allocate ETH to Mantle’s mETH Protocol, reflecting a shift in institutional strategy toward Ethereum-based yield infrastructure. The move supports Mantle’s broader plans, including mETH’s role in the upcoming MI4 index fund and Mantle Banking, which aims to integrate mETH into traditional finance.

Yesterday, Bitcoin spot ETFs saw $57.6M in inflows, entirely from non-GBTC funds, with GBTC recording no flow.

, featuring Spark—a DeFi platform with $2.6B in liquidity—is now live. Users can earn Snaps by posting, liking, or engaging with Spark-related content on Crypto Twitter. More Snaps means more rewards.

Beginner

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Mantle partners with Republic Technologies as mETH becomes first liquid staking token on public company balance sheet

Bybit Learn

Options

Bitcoin options and spot trading is fundamentally different and serves a different purpose that suit a trader's trading style. Find out more.

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Depending upon your trading interest, these contracts serve different purposes and yield different financial outcomes. When comparing options, it's crucial to understand the underlying trading mechanics and the flexibility from which these contracts derive their value.

A Bitcoin option gives traders the right, but not the obligation, to buy (call option) or sell (put option) BTC at a predetermined price (strike price) on or before a specific date (expiration date). Compared to spot trading, options provide a more flexible trading opportunity with calculated risks, as traders may choose whether or not to exercise the option if it becomes unprofitable. The maximum loss is limited to the premium paid for the option contract.

Traders who seek to hedge their positions may prefer options, as they allow them to speculate on Bitcoin's price movements or take advantage of market volatility without committing to buying or selling the asset outright.

Spot traders prefer to buy or sell actual Bitcoin (BTC) on cryptocurrency exchanges at the current market price, with settlement and ownership taking place immediately. Unlike options or futures trading, the spot market allows traders to directly own the underlying asset for transactions or long-term investments.

Compared to options trading, spot trading is best suited for beginning and intermediate traders who want direct exposure to Bitcoin and are interested in using it for various purposes or holding it for potential long-term gains.

Which Is Better for Beginners and Intermediate Traders?

Ultimately, the choice between Spot and Option trading must depend upon an individual’s knowledge, trading goals and risk tolerance. Beginners should start with spot trading to get acquainted with Bitcoin, and as they progress they can explore options trading, with proper research and understanding.

Explained: Bitcoin Options vs. Bitcoin Spot Trading

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