Crypto has scheduled catalysts — macro releases that move risk assets broadly, protocol upgrades, unlocks, and the large quarterly expiries. Anything with a date is anticipated by the options market.
The bump in the curve
An expiry spanning a known event carries higher implied volatility than the ones either side. That bump is the event’s price, and it is visible in the term structure before the event occurs.
Which means a trader buying options into the event is paying for it. The position profits only if the actual move exceeds what was charged — not if the event simply happens.
The collapse afterwards
Once the event resolves, its uncertainty is gone and the implied volatility priced for it falls immediately, in any outcome. This is the mechanism that produces the most frustrating result in options: correctly predicting a move, watching it happen, and still losing money because implied volatility fell more than the move gained.
It is the specific failure described in straddles and strangles, and it is not bad luck — it is the structure working exactly as designed.
What crypto adds
Two things. Because the market never closes, an event landing outside US hours is absorbed live rather than gapped over — and if it lands at a weekend it meets a thinner book, which amplifies the same news.
And a daily expiry means the event can be isolated precisely. In a monthly market an event trade carries weeks of unwanted duration; here you can buy the day.
The honest framing
A scheduled event is not an edge, because everyone can see it. Any edge lies in disagreeing with the price attached to it — and the earnings line NoVo uses on the equity side puts it best: a scheduled event widens the band and says nothing about direction.