Does Bitcoin Max Pain Pull Prices Toward Expiry?

Bitcoin max pain is better understood as a calculation of hypothetical option payouts than as a price target. In a backtest of 919 Deribit expiries across six coins, settlement was closer to the market price observed six hours before expiry than to max pain for every coin tested. The result argues against relying on max pain as a dependable last-hours magnet—but it is not a Bitcoin-only result. 10

What max pain measures

Max pain is the price at which the options in an expiry would require the least total payout from sellers to buyers if the contracts settled there. It is calculated from the options’ strike prices and positions; it does not, by itself, show that the market will move toward that level. 15

Deribit also does not settle options using a single last-second trade: its settlement price is based on a 30-minute time-weighted average of the relevant index. 15

What the 919-expiry backtest found

The study examined 919 Deribit options expiries across six coins, from February 14 to September 18, 2026. It recorded max pain six hours before each settlement and compared the eventual settlement with both that level and the coin’s price at the time of the reading. Settlement was closer to the prevailing price on every coin in the sample. 10

That comparison matters because it tests whether max pain offered a better reference than a simple baseline: the price the market was already trading at. In this test, it did not. But the reported result is about six coins collectively; it should not be presented as a Bitcoin-specific accuracy rate. 10

What a separate 35% figure does—and doesn’t—show

A separate source reports that max pain “called settlement right” 35% of the time in a test of 404 BTC and ETH expiries. That figure combines the two assets, and the available description does not explain the study’s exact definition of a correct call. It is therefore a reported result, not a standalone measure of Bitcoin-only predictive accuracy. 1

How to use max pain

Treat max pain as a snapshot of options positioning and a hypothetical payout level—not as a forecast that Bitcoin must reach before expiry. The backtest suggests a practical check: compare max pain with the current price and consider whether it has actually provided a better reference in the timeframe being assessed. In the six-hour comparison reported by the study, it did not. 1015

The evidence here is limited to the reported backtests. The 919-expiry study spans six coins, while the separate 404-expiry result combines BTC and ETH. Neither figure, as described in the available sources, gives a Bitcoin-only accuracy rate for the six-hour test. 110