Solana’s price trends this year follow a clear but unpleasant pattern. After hitting a new high near $296 in January, the rally quickly lost momentum. started a steady decline That went on for months.
Many traders attribute this weakness to: Risk-off sentiment across cryptocurrenciesBut a deeper on-chain breakdown shared by crypto analyst Ardi on X suggests this story started well before the January peak and has more to do with who was buying. And the person who quietly leaves.
Distribution had already begun before the January peak.
Solana has been on a clear downward trend since September, reaching a low of around $247 compared to its all-time high of $293 on January 19th. one of the most important Insights from Ardi analysis That said, Solana’s all-time high in January did not mark the start of delivery, but rather its high point.
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A graph attached to his post shows that sales volumes were already increasing in the months leading up to October, meaning large holders were preparing to exit long before the price reached its final peak. From that perspective, January’s highs look more like the final push up, rather than the start of a new economic expansion.
From that point on, the price trend began to form lower highs, and each rebound attempt lacked the power needed to regain all-time highs. Interestingly, despite other cryptocurrencies with large market caps such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, and BNB, Solana failed to reach new all-time highs. New all-time high All year round.
Another interesting feature of the data is the widening gap between the behavior of retailers and the behavior of leading companies. The cumulative delta indicator on the chart shows that retail-sized wallets have been consistently active throughout the year, increasing their activity even as Solana’s price has declined.
Medium-sized and institutional wallets, on the other hand, tell a completely different story. Their activity has been on the decline for several months, from a peak in January to the time of this writing.
Is Solana’s price becoming dependent on meme coin activity?
Aldi’s analysis also raises broader questions about what is currently driving demand for Solana. Besides Solana’s own retail activity, one of the few consistent sources of activity is the memecoin sector. The success and boom of meme coins like Cat in a Dogs World (MEW); Squirrel Peanut (PNUT)and FARTCOIN, which gained momentum in late 2024, helped push Solana to all-time highs during these periods.
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meme coin success culminated in the launch of The official Trump ($TRUMP) token, issued on Solana in January 2025, made impressive profits immediately after its launch. This contributed to Solana’s all-time high in January.
However, since then, the TRUMP token and other Solana-based meme coins have been trending downward in recent months, and no longer have the same level of attention and trading intensity that they did this time last year. This has led to the view that Solana’s price is increasingly sensitive to the success of meme coins in its ecosystem.
At the time of writing, Solana is trading at $121.50, down approximately 58.6% from January’s all-time high of $293.
Featured image from iStock, chart from Tradingview.com
