Solana makes another recovery attempt
Since October Solana (SOL) has faced a turbulent mix of price volatility, network resilience tests and shifting sentiment among traders and investors.
Price action has been notably unstable, with SOL experiencing sharp downside moves that wiped out substantial long positions and broke below key support levels. A dramatic example occurred during a New York trading session, when Solana was “pumped and dumped,” triggering over $250 million in long liquidations and sending the token down sharply from around $133.00 to roughly $122.00 in late November, illustrating just how quickly sentiment can flip in Solana markets. The volatility reflected broader macro pressure, including weaker tech stocks and risk-off behaviour, which continue to influence crypto risk assets.
Market analysis from recent price forecasts underscores the ongoing bearish environment. SOL has posted consecutive daily losses and was trading with declining open interest and negative funding rates, indicators that traders are increasingly positioned for further downside.
At the same time, the network has remained robust, weathering one of the largest distributed denial-of-service attacks ever recorded without any visible disruption to transaction processing. This resilience has been interpreted by some observers as a sign of the blockchain’s technical maturity, even as price action weakens.
Despite the short-term price weakness, interest in Solana from institutional and macro market watchers has not disappeared entirely. Market commentary has pointed to ongoing exchange-traded fund (ETF) inflows for Solana-related products in recent days, signalling that some institutional capital continues to flow into SOL-linked vehicles even as the spot price struggles. This suggests that demand at deeper levels remains intact for certain investor segments who are looking past near-term gyrations and focusing on long-term fundamentals.
On the network usage side, other recent reports have highlighted a broader shift in on-chain behaviour. Participation in Solana-based decentralised exchanges and memecoin trading has declined significantly, contributing to lower on-chain activity compared with earlier peaks, although the ecosystem still supports high throughput and remains second only to the largest platforms in various usage metrics. This divergence between transactional activity and price performance illustrates the complex dynamics at play, where underlying utility and speculative trading can move in different directions.
Taken together, the last few of months reveal Solana as a market under pressure but not without structural interest.
The price remains volatile and sensitive to macro sentiment and technical trading dynamics, yet institutional interest, blockchain resilience and longer-term narratives around decentralized finance and high-speed throughput suggest that SOL’s story is not purely bearish.
Whether current levels represent a temporary bottom or the precursor to further downside will likely depend on macro stability, risk asset demand and whether on-chain developments translate into renewed confidence among a broader investor base.
Solana bearish scenario:
Despite Friday’s short-term recovery from Thursday’s $116.94 low, SOL remains in a short-term downtrend while trading below its downtrend line and Wednesday’s $133.96 high.
Even if such a short-term bullish reversal were to ensue, the next higher 20 November to 4 December highs at $144.65-to-$146.93 would need to be overcome for SOL to potentially bottom out.
A fall through the current December low at $116.94 would likely lead to the psychological $100.00 mark being eyed.
Solana bullish scenario:
Friday’s bounce off its eight month $116.94 low needs to have legs and take it above Wednesday’s $133.96 high for a short-term bullish reversal to become feasible.
Even then the 20 November to 4 December highs at $144.65-to-$146.93 would need to be exceeded for a sustained bullish reversal to be on the cards.
In such a scenario the 200-day simple moving average (SMA) at $174.98 would probably be back in play.
Short-term outlook: bearish while below Wednesday’s $133.96 high.
Medium-term outlook: bearish while below the 4 December high at $146.93