The crypto altcoin Solana (SOL) has seen a surge of over 50% in the past week, causing deep-pocketed traders to shift hundreds of millions of dollars worth of SOL to popular cryptocurrency exchanges. Whale Alert highlighted the transfers, leading to speculation that a market sell-off may be imminent.
On Tuesday, Whale Alert reported multiple transactions involving Solana, including an anonymous whale transferring 1.2 million SOL – worth nearly $150 million – to an unknown wallet. It is unclear why the whale moved the cryptocurrency.
Two other transactions included 456K SOL, worth nearly $54 million, sent from an unidentified wallet to an unknown recipient; and $19.4 million worth of SOL (more than $163K), sent from an unidentified whale to a wallet linked to Binance. Also, 256,531 SOL, amounting to roughly $30.9 million, were transferred from an unknown wallet to Coinbase, as well as 87,351 SOL ($10.4 million) and 97,294 SOL ($10.8 million), both sent from an undisclosed wallet to Coinbase.
Previous whale behavior has been known to shake markets and cause price fluctuations. In November, CoinGape reported that the price of SOL fell below $55 due to similar activity.
At the time of writing, the SOL price stands at $112.4, up 1.6% in the last 24 hours. The altcoin has skyrocketed 906% year-to-date, likely due to the bullish sentiment around the crypto space and Bitcoin surpassing $42,000.
According to data from Santiment, the hype and sentiment for SOL are on the rise, and DEX volumes on Solana have increased 100-fold since the last quarter. Though these metrics are a good sign for Solana holders and buyers, investors should be mindful of the volatility of the cryptocurrency market and the recent choppy trading.
