While bitcoin seems to be hovering just above that $110,000 mark and ether is taking a bit of a breather after its own run, there’s another story quietly unfolding. Solana has been putting on a pretty impressive show lately, and it’s starting to turn some heads.
The token was trading around $211 earlier this week. That’s a solid 33% jump from where it was sitting back at the start of August. Honestly, it’s been one of the top performers in that big CoinDesk 20 Index over the last month. It’s not just against the dollar, either. It’s gained a notable 34% against bitcoin itself and is up 14% compared to ether since the middle of last month.
A Shift Toward Alternative Cryptocurrencies
This isn’t just about Solana doing well on its own. Analysts are seeing this as part of a bigger trend—what some are calling a rotation into altcoins. Money seems to be moving around. Sergei Gorev from YouHodler pointed out that we’re in a season where crypto holders are redistributing their profits. He mentioned there’s been a “noticeable increase” in capital flowing into SOL, with some liquidity moving out of bitcoin and into these so-called second-tier tokens.
The interesting part is that this might not be a short-term fling. Gorev suggests these flows could stick around for a while. Corporate investors, he thinks, are on the lookout for large, liquid projects to hold for the longer term. In his view, Solana and XRP are shaping up to be the “next interesting market ideas.”
Following Ethereum’s Playbook
Jeff Dorman from Arca draws a direct parallel to what happened with ether earlier this year. He tipped SOL to essentially replicate ETH’s big turnaround. Remember, ether saw a huge resurgence—nearly a 200% rally since April. That was fueled by a few key things: stablecoin adoption, massive ETF inflows, and this relentless buying from digital asset treasuries, or DATs.
Dorman thinks Solana is set to run the exact same playbook in the coming months. And the pieces are already falling into place. We got the first U.S.-listed Solana ETF in July, though it was futures-based. The bigger deal is that heavyweights like VanEck and Fidelity have filed for spot products, with decisions expected later this year.
On top of that, he notes that at least three Solana-focused DATs are raising funds right now. That could potentially channel up to $2.65 billion into SOL over the next month. That’s a lot of potential buying pressure.
Why the Reaction Could Be Significant
Here’s the thing that makes this interesting. Solana’s entire market capitalization is only about one-fifth the size of Ethereum’s. That means its price could be way more reactive to these kinds of inflows if they actually materialize. Dorman put it pretty bluntly, calling SOL “the most obvious long right now.” His basic math is compelling: if $20 billion of new demand pushed ETH up 200%, what could $2.5 billion or more do to SOL?
There’s other news adding to the momentum, too. Galaxy Digital just tokenized its shares on the Solana blockchain. And the recent approval of the Alpenglow upgrade promises to improve the network’s transaction speed and finality. It feels like a lot of things are lining up at once. Whether it all plays out, of course, is another question. But it’s certainly a story worth watching.