Getting Started With Futures Data

This notebook demonstrates basic functionality offered by the Coin Metrics Python API Client and Market Data Feed.

Coin Metrics offers a vast assortment of data for hundreds of cryptoassets. The Python API Client allows for easy access to this data using Python without needing to create your own wrappers using requests and other such libraries.

Resources

To understand the data that Coin Metrics offers, feel free to peruse the resources below.

File Download

Download the entire notebook as either a jupyter notebook to run yourself or as a pdf from the two links below

Notebook Setup

Futures Catalog

Futures contracts are standardized contracts that allow counterparties to enter into an agreement to buy or sell a standardized asset under contract specifications that are defined by the exchange. Each specific futures contract offered by a specific exchange will have identical contract specifications regardless of who is the counterparty.

The contract specifications include information such as the underlying base and quote asset, the margin asset, the contract size, the listing time, expiration time, and other terms.

Coin Metrics offers contract specifications for both futures and options. Here we define futures to include both non-perpetual futures that expire and perpetual futures (sometimes called perpetual swaps).

Open Interest

Open interest represents the number of contracts that are currently outstanding and not settled for a specific derivatives market.

Open Interest is available at various levels:

  • Assets level (i.e btc)

  • Asset Pair level (i.e. btc-usd)

  • Exchange level (i.e. binance)

  • Exchange-Asset level (i.e. binance-btc)

  • Market level (i.e. binance-BTCUSDT-future)

BTC Open Interest at the Market Level

market
time
contract_count
value_usd
database_time
exchange_time

0

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:42:00+00:00

87506.236

5214374094.5096

2024-09-15 21:42:31.800754+00:00

2024-09-15 21:42:00+00:00

1

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:43:00+00:00

87493.551

5213766952.1553

2024-09-15 21:43:55.721238+00:00

2024-09-15 21:43:00+00:00

2

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:44:00+00:00

87505.378

5215066763.2038

2024-09-15 21:44:48.749434+00:00

2024-09-15 21:44:00+00:00

3

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:45:00+00:00

87499.076

5215364925.1648

2024-09-15 21:45:41.693858+00:00

2024-09-15 21:45:00+00:00

4

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:46:00+00:00

87503.139

5214338303.9517

2024-09-15 21:46:35.001759+00:00

2024-09-15 21:46:00+00:00

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

1435

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-16 21:37:00+00:00

84817.5

4903884915.75

2024-09-16 21:37:39.951283+00:00

2024-09-16 21:37:00+00:00

1436

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-16 21:38:00+00:00

84825.836

4902466778.702

2024-09-16 21:38:33.480165+00:00

2024-09-16 21:38:00+00:00

1437

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-16 21:39:00+00:00

84832.474

4902417772.9756

2024-09-16 21:39:26.976255+00:00

2024-09-16 21:39:00+00:00

1438

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-16 21:40:00+00:00

84842.805

4902471801.315

2024-09-16 21:40:46.680850+00:00

2024-09-16 21:40:00+00:00

1439

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-16 21:41:00+00:00

84851.162

4904380193.3676

2024-09-16 21:41:40.406353+00:00

2024-09-16 21:41:00+00:00

1440 rows × 6 columns

BTC Open Interest by Exchange (Exchange-Asset Endpoint)

Use the get_exchange_asset_metrics client function to pull the all BTC exchange-asset pairs at daily frequency:

exchange_asset
time
open_interest_reported_future_usd

0

binance-btc

2023-09-18

3.074676e+09

1

binance-btc

2023-09-19

3.220249e+09

2

binance-btc

2023-09-20

3.359060e+09

3

binance-btc

2023-09-21

3.272911e+09

4

binance-btc

2023-09-22

3.280109e+09

...

...

...

...

3280

okex-btc

2024-09-12

2.346645e+09

3281

okex-btc

2024-09-13

2.431933e+09

3282

okex-btc

2024-09-14

2.693548e+09

3283

okex-btc

2024-09-15

2.608818e+09

3284

okex-btc

2024-09-16

2.569876e+09

3285 rows × 3 columns

Liquidations

Next, we'll take a look at liquidations data. As a reminder, exchanges which offer futures markets utilize a risk management system that will attempt to close a user’s position before the point at which the user begins to owe more than what is in the user's account. The trade or order that closes the user's position is referred to as a liquidation.

This time, we'll use the get_market_liquidations client function to pull all BTCUSDT liquidations over the last 24 hours on Binance:

market
time
coin_metrics_id
amount
price
type
database_time
side

0

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:54:34.145000+00:00

1726437274145000000

0.011

59648.0

trade

2024-09-15 21:54:34.297968+00:00

buy

1

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 21:57:52.361000+00:00

1726437472361000000

0.006

59663.1

trade

2024-09-15 21:57:53.574117+00:00

buy

2

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 22:02:17.426000+00:00

1726437737426000000

0.242

59511.0

trade

2024-09-15 22:02:18.244282+00:00

sell

3

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 22:02:19.433000+00:00

1726437739433000000

0.041

59503.1

trade

2024-09-15 22:02:20.362299+00:00

sell

4

binance-BTCUSDT-future

2024-09-15 22:02:33.095000+00:00

1726437753095000000

0.009

59479.2

trade

2024-09-15 22:02:34.376645+00:00

sell

Notice that this timeseries also includes the liquidation type. Some exchanges report “liquidations orders” in which they will report the creation of a liquidation order when a trader’s position initially enters liquidation. When a trader’s position enters liquidation, an exchange will typically enter a limit order at the price at which the trader will be bankruptcy price. The liquidation orders will show the amount of the position that is being liquidated and the liquidation price, but will not represent the matched trades that are executed as a result of the liquidation. Other exchanges will report “liquidation trades” which represent the actual matched trade as a result of a liquidation order but will not report liquidation orders. Some exchanges will report both liquidation orders and liquidation trades.

Aggregated Liquidation Metrics

In addition to examining individual liquidations, we can also leverage aggregated liquidations metrics. This allows us to quickly view the total amount of USD-denominated liquidations that have occurred over large timeframes, without needing to aggregate the amounts at the trade level.

exchange_asset
metrics

61

binance-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

335

bitfinex-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

401

bitmex-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

577

bybit-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

925

deribit-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

978

ftx-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

1213

huobi-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

1475

kraken-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

1688

okex-btc

[{'metric': 'liquidations_reported_future_buy_...

exchange_asset
time
liquidations_reported_future_buy_usd_1h
liquidations_reported_future_sell_usd_1h

0

binance-btc

2024-09-15 10:00:00+00:00

41189.76644

-123119.61981

1

binance-btc

2024-09-15 11:00:00+00:00

2219.32844

-26757.74386

2

binance-btc

2024-09-15 12:00:00+00:00

20766.66452

-540.03552

3

binance-btc

2024-09-15 13:00:00+00:00

166694.89730

-28269.05000

4

binance-btc

2024-09-15 14:00:00+00:00

208587.82170

-319846.10928

...

...

...

...

...

167

okex-btc

2024-09-16 16:00:00+00:00

2309.60000

-231.20680

168

okex-btc

2024-09-16 17:00:00+00:00

753306.85950

-676171.41858

169

okex-btc

2024-09-16 18:00:00+00:00

0.00000

-245113.87800

170

okex-btc

2024-09-16 19:00:00+00:00

0.00000

-18840.23928

171

okex-btc

2024-09-16 20:00:00+00:00

52104.18704

-131510.72160

172 rows × 4 columns

asset
time
open_interest_reported_future_usd

0

btc

2024-09-14 22:00:00+00:00

27085472082.8134

1

btc

2024-09-14 23:00:00+00:00

27086895034.416401

2

btc

2024-09-15 00:00:00+00:00

27089846618.242401

3

btc

2024-09-15 01:00:00+00:00

27103605277.447899

4

btc

2024-09-15 02:00:00+00:00

27206441557.918598

Funding Rates

Funding rates are a mechanism that exchanges use to ensure that perpetual futures trade at a price that is close to the price of the underlying spot markets. The funding rate is used to calculate the funding fee which long position holders pay short position holders, or vice versa, as a way to incentivize market participants to take positions that keep perpetual futures prices close to the underlying.

Coin Metrics funding rate data from the timeseries/market-funding-rates endpoint includes the following fields:

  • market: The id of the market. Market ids use the following naming convention: exchangeName-baseAsset-quoteAsset-spot for spot markets, exchangeName-futuresSymbol-future for futures markets, and exchangeName-optionsSymbol-option for options markets.

  • time: The exchange-reported time in ISO 8601 date-time format. Always with nanoseconds precision.

  • rate: The funding rate expressed as a percentage over the period. For example, if the funding rate is 0.10%, expressed as an 8 hour rate and calculated over the past 8 hours, the rate is 0.0010.

  • period: The periodicity of the funding rate. If the rate is 0.0010then this rate would be applied every period defined by this field.

  • interval: The interval of time over which the funding rate is calculated.

  • database_time: The timestamp when the data was saved in the database in ISO 8601 date-time format with nanoseconds precision.

market
min_time
max_time

0

binance-1000BONKUSDC-future

2024-05-01 00:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 20:00:00+00:00

1

binance-1000BONKUSDT-future

2023-11-22 16:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 20:00:00+00:00

2

binance-1000BTTCUSDT-future

2022-01-26 08:00:00.001000+00:00

2022-04-11 08:00:00+00:00

3

binance-1000FLOKIUSDT-future

2023-05-06 16:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 16:00:00+00:00

4

binance-1000LUNCBUSD-future

2022-05-30 16:00:00.005000+00:00

2023-06-08 08:00:00+00:00

...

...

...

...

442

binance-ZILUSDT-future

2020-06-17 08:00:00.007000+00:00

2024-09-16 16:00:00+00:00

443

binance-ZILUSD_PERP-future

2022-04-06 08:00:00.013000+00:00

2022-12-26 08:00:00.014000+00:00

444

binance-ZKUSDT-future

2024-06-17 12:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 20:00:00+00:00

445

binance-ZROUSDT-future

2024-06-20 16:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 20:00:00+00:00

446

binance-ZRXUSDT-future

2020-06-24 08:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 16:00:00+00:00

447 rows × 3 columns

market
time
database_time
rate
period
interval

0

bitmex-XBTUSD-future

2024-09-10 04:00:00+00:00

2024-09-10 04:00:55.910555+00:00

-0.000116

08:00:00

08:00:00

1

bitmex-XBTUSD-future

2024-09-10 12:00:00+00:00

2024-09-10 12:00:40.929397+00:00

0.000037

08:00:00

08:00:00

2

bitmex-XBTUSD-future

2024-09-10 20:00:00+00:00

2024-09-10 20:00:01.451626+00:00

0.000048

08:00:00

08:00:00

3

bitmex-XBTUSD-future

2024-09-11 04:00:00+00:00

2024-09-11 04:00:15.978545+00:00

0.0001

08:00:00

08:00:00

4

bitmex-XBTUSD-future

2024-09-11 12:00:00+00:00

2024-09-11 12:00:04.727025+00:00

0.0001

08:00:00

08:00:00

...

...

...

...

...

...

...

58

okex-BTC-USD-SWAP-future

2024-09-15 08:00:00+00:00

2024-09-15 08:00:05.108766+00:00

0.000062

08:00:00

08:00:00

59

okex-BTC-USD-SWAP-future

2024-09-15 16:00:00+00:00

2024-09-15 16:00:12.545520+00:00

0.000061

08:00:00

08:00:00

60

okex-BTC-USD-SWAP-future

2024-09-16 00:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 00:00:04.734967+00:00

0.000046

08:00:00

08:00:00

61

okex-BTC-USD-SWAP-future

2024-09-16 08:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 08:00:07.052638+00:00

0.000013

08:00:00

08:00:00

62

okex-BTC-USD-SWAP-future

2024-09-16 16:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 16:00:06.345528+00:00

0.000011

08:00:00

08:00:00

63 rows × 6 columns

Aggregated Funding Rates

Coin Metrics also calculates several aggregated funding rate metrics.

Aggregate Funding Rate is the average funding rate weighted by open interest, published once per hour and representing the average funding rate converted to 8 hour, 1 day, 30 day, and 1 year time periods.

  • futures_aggregate_funding_rate_usd_margin_*: metrics represent the average funding rate weighted by open interest from perpetual futures markets where the margin asset is U.S. dollars or stablecoins converted to a specified time period.

  • futures_aggregate_funding_rate_coin_margin_*: represent the average funding rate weighted by open interest from perpetual futures markets where the margin asset is equivalent to the underlying base asset converted to a specified period.

  • futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_*: represent the average funding rate weighted by open interest from all perpetual futures markets, regardless of the margin asset, converted to a specified time period.

asset
time
futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1d_period
futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_period
futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_30d_period

0

btc

2023-10-01 00:00:00+00:00

0.000101

0.036712

0.003017

1

btc

2023-10-02 00:00:00+00:00

0.000087

0.031662

0.002602

2

btc

2023-10-03 00:00:00+00:00

0.000086

0.031306

0.002573

3

btc

2023-10-04 00:00:00+00:00

0.000109

0.039942

0.003283

4

btc

2023-10-05 00:00:00+00:00

0.000071

0.025923

0.002131

Plotting a heatmap of BTC funding rates across exchanges

exchange_asset
metric
frequency
min_time
max_time

4711

binance-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-07-27 18:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

24034

bitfinex-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-12-02 09:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

29530

bitmex-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-07-27 18:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

41723

bybit-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2021-05-01 20:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

66927

deribit-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-07-27 18:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

69721

ftx-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-07-27 18:00:00+00:00

2022-11-12 04:00:00+00:00

88682

huobi-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-07-27 18:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

105482

kraken-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-10-09 09:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

126904

okex-btc

futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_p...

1d

2020-10-30 09:00:00+00:00

2024-09-16 21:00:00+00:00

exchange_asset
time
futures_aggregate_funding_rate_all_margin_1y_period

0

binance-btc

2023-01-01 00:00:00+00:00

0.1095

1

binance-btc

2023-01-02 00:00:00+00:00

0.012148

2

binance-btc

2023-01-03 00:00:00+00:00

0.046845

3

binance-btc

2023-01-04 00:00:00+00:00

0.041311

4

binance-btc

2023-01-05 00:00:00+00:00

0.061746

...

...

...

...

2915

okex-btc

2023-12-27 00:00:00+00:00

0.376005

2916

okex-btc

2023-12-28 00:00:00+00:00

0.254648

2917

okex-btc

2023-12-29 00:00:00+00:00

0.536332

2918

okex-btc

2023-12-30 00:00:00+00:00

0.455873

2919

okex-btc

2023-12-31 00:00:00+00:00

0.548358

2920 rows × 3 columns

time
2023-01-01 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-02 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-03 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-04 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-05 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-06 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-07 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-08 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-09 00:00:00+00:00
2023-01-10 00:00:00+00:00
...
2023-12-22 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-23 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-24 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-25 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-26 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-27 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-28 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-29 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-30 00:00:00+00:00
2023-12-31 00:00:00+00:00

exchange_asset

binance-btc

0.109500

0.012148

0.046845

0.041311

0.061746

0.077517

0.096432

0.089722

0.057266

0.017031

...

0.281263

0.206533

0.154560

0.195473

0.425674

0.383043

0.379663

0.549031

0.457254

0.387193

bitfinex-btc

0.240054

0.382189

0.211039

0.229558

0.074891

0.131655

0.131765

0.160125

0.113086

0.129979

...

0.270820

0.156269

0.125486

0.308607

0.465474

0.147093

0.655639

0.688972

0.453521

0.265981

bitmex-btc

0.109500

-0.147477

-0.027653

-0.075540

0.109140

0.058906

-0.078846

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

...

0.124057

0.120385

0.105715

0.111534

0.109102

0.118988

0.178754

0.469497

0.127023

0.127770

bybit-btc

0.332716

0.328811

0.106620

0.109500

0.108059

0.056104

0.076392

-0.001772

0.090156

-0.066673

...

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

0.109500

deribit-btc

0.004014

-0.004356

0.000194

-0.000777

-0.000004

-0.003702

-0.000003

0.000411

0.000128

0.009021

...

0.162735

0.222283

0.009642

0.074016

0.344480

0.472755

0.558913

0.589233

0.398686

0.509796

huobi-btc

0.109500

0.099561

0.109500

0.109500

-0.031955

0.109500

0.109500

0.815508

-0.012098

0.062326

...

0.261585

1.119745

0.330376

0.585262

0.487209

1.132452

0.657258

0.739781

0.549361

0.700592

kraken-btc

0.030208

0.040457

-0.095853

-0.027047

0.061041

-0.130703

-0.061580

0.036233

-0.006607

0.217927

...

0.316554

0.166807

0.167266

0.130185

0.474480

0.381600

0.226822

0.361264

0.169106

0.289377

okex-btc

0.209290

0.191624

-0.019627

0.007415

0.206787

0.104460

-0.038630

0.124934

0.025828

0.020786

...

0.396916

0.417243

-0.002470

0.271116

0.250061

0.376005

0.254648

0.536332

0.455873

0.548358

8 rows × 365 columns

Cumulative Funding Rate

Cumulative Funding Rate is the cumulative average funding rate that would be accumulated by contract holders over a specified time period. Published once per hour, representing the cumulative realized funding rate over the previous 1 day, 7 day, and 30 day time periods.

  • futures_cumulative_funding_rate_usd_margin_*: metrics represent the cumulative average funding rate weighted by open interest from futures markets where the margin asset is U.S. dollars or stablecoins over the previous specified time period.

  • futures_cumulative_funding_rate_coin_margin_*: metrics represent the cumulative average funding rate weighted by open interest from futures markets where the margin asset is equivalent to the underlying base asset over the previous specified time period.

  • futures_cumulative_funding_rate_all_margin_*: metrics represent the cumulative average funding rate weighted by open interest from all futures markets, regardless of the margin asset, over the previous specified time period.

asset
time
futures_cumulative_funding_rate_all_margin_rolling_1d
futures_cumulative_funding_rate_all_margin_rolling_30d
futures_cumulative_funding_rate_all_margin_rolling_7d

0

btc

2023-01-01 00:00:00+00:00

0.00041

0.002146

0.0015

1

btc

2023-01-02 00:00:00+00:00

0.000358

0.002479

0.001736

2

btc

2023-01-03 00:00:00+00:00

0.000128

0.002587

0.001735

3

btc

2023-01-04 00:00:00+00:00

0.000176

0.002641

0.001754

4

btc

2023-01-05 00:00:00+00:00

0.000194

0.002957

0.001745

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