Complicated imo. Primarily it is an indicator of demand, it tends to be high during bull markets and low or negative during crashes. And since you pay the funding rate, you can think of -ve funding during a crash as an incentive to provide support, ie a risk premium.
Historically it has been a bad indicator for taking directional risk though — primarily because there is a strong short-term momentum effect and you end up holding counter trend positions, which has historically been negative EV.
