September has started much like August ended, with low volumes, subdued volatility, and most of the market-moving headlines coming from traditional finance.

Sept. 4, 2025
 
 

What to know:

 

By James Van Straten (All times ET unless indicated otherwise)

 

September has started much like August ended, with low volumes, subdued volatility, and most of the market-moving headlines coming from traditional finance.

Gold rose to $3,560 before easing back, while government bond yields globally retreated from recent highs.

 

Bitcoin perpetual funding rates, payments designed to keep perpetual futures contracts close to the spot price, have cooled and are now around 6% after hitting double-digit levels earlier. Open interest, meantime, continues to drop, with just over 720,000 contracts outstanding, denominated in BTC.

 

As for publicly listed bitcoin treasury companies, their multiples to net asset value (mNAV) are also extending declines.

 

Strategy (MSTR) now trades at an mNAV of just over 1.55 and Metaplanet (3350) sits at 1.71 after a 7% share-priced ecline in Japan trading. KindlyMD (NAKA) dropped a further 9% on Wednesday, leaving it down 75% from its all-time high, and now trades at an mNAV of 2.5.

 

More than $4.5 billion in crypto options are set to expire on Deribit, on Friday, which is also the day of the U.S. nonfarm payrolls report. For bitcoin, $3.28 billion in notional value is due, with a max pain point at $112,000 and a put-call ratio of 1.38.

 

"Open interest is tilted toward puts, with notable clustering around the $105,000 to $110,000 strikes, suggesting downside protection remains a key theme," the derivatives exchange said in a post on X.

 

Ether options account for $1.27 billion in notional value, with a put-call ratio of 0.78 and a max pain level of $4,400.

 

Deribit notes "flows are more balanced, but calls are building above $4,500, signaling growing interest in upside optionality". Stay alert!

 

What to Watch

Crypto

  • Sept. 4: Polygon will switch its mainnet token to POL from MATIC. Holders of MATIC on Ethereum, Polygon zkEVM or centralized exchanges may need to take action.
  • Sept. 4: Apex Fusion's dedicated EVM-compatible layer-2 blockchain, Nexus, goes live. The chain, which aims to unite UTXO and EVM ecosystems, integrates with Tenderly’s infrastructure and development toolkit.
  • Sept. 10, 9:15 a.m.: Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan V. Gould will talk about digital assets at the CoinDesk: Policy & Regulation Conference in Washington.

Macro

  • Sept. 4, 8:15 a.m.: Automatic Data Processing (ADP) releases August U.S. private-sector employment data.
    • Employment Change Est. 68K vs. Prev. 104K
  • Sept. 4, 9:30 a.m.: S&P Global releases August Canada data on manufacturing and services activity.
    • Composite PMI Prev. 48.7
    • Services PMI Prev. 49.3
  • Sept. 4, 9:45 a.m.: S&P Global releases (final) August U.S. data on manufacturing and services activity.
    • Composite PMI Est. 55.4 vs. Prev. 55.1
    • Services PMI Est. 55.4 vs. Prev. 55.7
  • Sept. 4, 10 a.m.: The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) releases August U.S. services sector data.
    • Services PMI Est. Est. 51 vs. Prev. 50.1
  • Sept. 4, 1 p.m.: Uruguay's National Institute of Statistics releases August inflation data.
    • Inflation Rate YoY Prev. 4.53%
  • Sept. 4, 3 p.m.: Colombia's National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE) releases August producer price inflation data.
    • PPI YoY Prev. 2.2%
  • Sept. 4, evening: President Donald Trump will host a private dinner in the newly renovated White House Rose Garden for about two dozen top tech and business leaders, including Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, Bill Gates and Sam Altman.
  • Sept. 5, 8 a.m.: The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) releases July producer price inflation data.
    • PPI MoM Prev. -1.25%
    • PPI YoY Prev. 3.24%
  • Sept. 5, 8:30 a.m.: Statistics Canada releases August employment data.
    • Unemployment Rate Est. 7% vs. Prev. 6.9%
    • Employment Change Est. 7.5K vs. Prev. -40.8K
  • Sept. 5, 8:30 a.m.: The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics releases August employment data.
    • Nonfarm Payrolls Est. 75K vs. Prev. 73K
    • Unemployment Rate Est. 4.3% vs. Prev. 4.2%
    • Government Payrolls Prev. -10K
    • Manufacturing Payrolls Est. -5K vs. Prev. -11K
  • Sept. 5: S&P 500 Rebalance update released after market close. Strategy (MSTR) is one of the companies being considered for inclusion in the index.
  • Sept. 5, 7 p.m.: Colombia’s National Administrative Department of Statistics releases August consumer price inflation data.
    • Inflation Rate MoM Prev. 0.28%
    • Inflation Rate YoY Prev. 4.9%
  • Sept. 5, 7 p.m.: El Salvador's Statistics and Census Office releases August consumer price inflation data.
    • Inflation Rate MoM Prev. 0.33%
    • Inflation Rate YoY Prev. -0.14%

Earnings (Estimates based on FactSet data)

  • Sept. 4: Cango (CANG), post-market

  • Sept. 9: GameStop (GME), post-market, $0.19

 
 

Token Events

Governance Votes & Calls

  • Arbitrum DAO is voting on upgrading Arbitrum One and Nova to ArbOS 50 Dia, adding support for Ethereum’s Fusaka fork, new EIPs, bug fixes and a native mint/burn feature (for Orbit chains only). Voting ends Sept. 4.
  • Uniswap DAO is voting on deploying Uniswap v3 on Ronin with $1M in RON and $500K in UNI incentives to make it the chain’s primary decentralized exchange. Voting ends Sept. 6.
  • Lido DAO is voting on a proposal to migrate Nethermind’s ~7,000 Ethereum validators to infrastructure operated by Twinstake, a staking provider co-founded by Nethermind. Voting ends Sept. 8.
  • Uniswap DAO is voting to establish “DUNI,” a Wyoming DUNA as its legal entity, preserving decentralized governance while enabling off-chain operations and liability protections, with $16.5M in UNI for legal/tax budgets and $75K in UNI for compliance. Voting ends Sept. 8.
  • Uniswap DAO is voting on an updated Unichain-USDS growth plan to accelerate adoption through performance-based incentives and DAO-guided distribution. The proposal introduces minimum KPIs, a “No result, no reward” model. Voting ends Sept. 9.

Unlocks

  • Sept. 5: Immutable (IMX) to unlock 1.27% of its circulating supply worth $12.43 million.
  • Sept. 11: Aptos (APT) to unlock 2.2% of its circulating supply worth $48.41 million.
  • Sept. 15: Starknet (STRK) to unlock 5.98% of its circulating supply worth $15.33 million.
  • Sept. 15: Sei (SEI) to unlock 1.18% of its circulating supply worth $15.89 million.
  • Sept. 16: Arbitrum (ARB) to unlock 2.03% of its circulating supply worth $46.02 million.

Token Launches

  • Sept. 4: Gata (GATA) to be listed on Binance Alpha, MEXC, Bitget, Gate.io, and others.
  • Sept. 4: Tradoor (TRADOOR) to be listed on Binance Alpha, Bitget, MEXC and others.
 

Conferences

The CoinDesk Policy & Regulation conference (formerly known as State of Crypto) is a one-day boutique event held in Washington on Sept. 10 that allows general counsels, compliance officers and regulatory executives to meet with public officials responsible for crypto legislation and regulatory oversight. Space is limited.

  • Day 2 of 2: CONF3RENCE (Dortmund, Germany)
  • Day 2 of 3: bitcoin++ (Istanbul)
  • Day 1 of 2: ETHWarsaw 2025 (Warsaw)
  • Day 1 of 3: Taipei Blockchain Week (Taiwan)
  • Sept. 5: Bitcoin Indonesia Conference 2025 (Bali)
  • Sept. 9-10: Fintech Week London 2025
  • Sept. 9-10: WOW Summit Hong Kong 2025
  • Sept. 9-13: Boston Blockchain Week (Quincy, Massachusetts)

Join the first major crypto regulation and policy gathering of the fall. CoinDesk: Policy & Regulation unites D.C.’s most important public officials with legal, policy and compliance leaders from the private sector. Don't miss keynotes representing the Senate, House, SEC, Treasury and OCC... and much more.

Space is limited. Use code CDB15 for 15% off your registration.

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