TL;DR
- Major Whale Offloads: A significant Solana ($SOL) whale has sold nearly $100 million worth of SOL tokens in 2024, averaging 19,306 SOL tokens per week.
- Market Impact: Despite the sell-off, Solana’s price has shown resilience, trading at $133 and up over 27% this year, recovering from the FTX collapse.
- Future Outlook: The whale still holds 1.88 million SOL tokens staked, raising concerns about future price stability and potential further liquidations.
In a year marked by volatility in the cryptocurrency market, Solana ($SOL) has faced additional challenges due to a significant sell-off by a major whale or institutional holder. According to on-chain analysis service Lookonchain, this entity has offloaded nearly $100 million worth of SOL tokens since the beginning of 2024.
A whale/institution sold 695K $SOL($99.5M) this year!
Since Jan 1, this whale/institution has been selling an average of 19,306 $SOL($2.76M) weekly, totaling nearly $100 million worth of $SOL!
The whale/institution still has 1.88M $SOL($255.89M) staked.https://t.co/v6mJegPKCa… pic.twitter.com/3XHhPQJbdq
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) September 3, 2024
Weekly Sales Impact
The whale has been consistently selling an average of 19,306 SOL tokens per week, amounting to approximately $2.76 million each week. This sustained selling pressure has resulted in a total of 695,000 SOL tokens being liquidated from the market so far this year.
Despite these significant sales, the whale still holds a substantial amount of SOL, with 1.88 million tokens worth over $250 million currently staked on the network.
Lookonchain also reports that another unidentified whale wallet recently withdrew 1,100 Bitcoin (BTC) valued at $64.26 million from a hot wallet linked to the leading crypto exchange Binance. At the time of writing, BTC is trading at $56,729, reflecting a nearly 5% drop for the day.
Additionally, the blockchain monitor identified an early investor in the DeFi protocol Aave (AAVE) who has incurred significant losses after holding the asset for nearly three years.
On March 28, 2021, and again on June 12, 2023, this whale acquired 17,447 AAVE from Binance, totaling a value of $4.3 million, with an average purchase price of $246.
Market Reaction
Solana’s price has been affected by this persistent selling pressure, trading at $133 at the time of writing. The cryptocurrency has gained around 0.50% in its value over the past month amid a broader market downturn that also saw Bitcoin’s price drop below the $58,000 mark.
However, Solana has shown resilience, being up more than 27% so far this year and over 560% in the last 12 months, recovering from the collapse of FTX, a major supporter of the Solana ecosystem.
Future Outlook
The ongoing sell-off by this whale raises questions about the future price stability of Solana. While the whale’s remaining holdings continue to earn yield through staking, the market will be closely watching for any further large-scale liquidations.
Investors and analysts alike are keen to see how Solana navigates these challenges and whether it can maintain its upward trajectory in the face of such significant selling pressure.
