The crypto market has shown signs of recovery over the past few weeks, with coins and tokens coming back to their previous values and breaking two-year records.
Besides the price increase of major cryptos, Solana carried the growth of the altcoins, hitting record prices and returning to previous values of the 2022 crypto boom. SOL exceeded most of the popular coins, such as Binance Coin. This growth was accompanied by an increase in total value locked, market cap and wallet activity.
Let’s review SOL’s performance and highlight the SOL vs BNB price rally and market action that led to this growth.
The last quarter of 2023 witnessed a recovery of most cryptocurrencies, with Bitcoin going back to historical prices and crossing the $50k mark in 2024. Ethereum was also part of this boom, accompanied by a rise in wallet and staking activities and market capitalisation.
Solana made the headlines after it outperformed Binance Coin (BNB), the native currency of the leading exchange platform. Not only did it record better growth, but it also managed to displace it from the #4 position in the best cryptocurrencies.
At the same time, the market witnessed increased confidence in the Solana ecosystem and platform as the market motivated investors to launch or increase their DeFi investments in the Solana network.
Solana’s price crossed the $100 threshold for the first time in two years, growing around 340% of its value in Q4 2023, making it one of the best altcoins to buy right now. Moreover, the volume of transactions in SOL struck the $1 Billion mark at $1.68 Billion and moved towards its previous record of $1.88 B.
Moreover, the number of SOL active wallets increased from just north of 300,000 in October 2023 to 1.3 Million wallets, increasing the value of locked and staked coins on the SOL-based DeFi projects and platforms.
Additionally, for the first time since 2021, SOL’s market cap exceeded $50 Billion, which has been increasing dramatically since October 2023, improving its position as one of the top 10 altcoins.
As of writing, Solana ranks 5th by market cap, which has dropped after briefly ranking at #4 over BNB. Despite the Binance coin taking its position back, there is a close SOL vs BNB race between 51 and 52 Billion dollars.
However, Solana is still superior to BNB market cap in the last 24 analyses, marking the ongoing increase of SOL value.
We track the price action of Solana by analysing its valuation using the exponential moving averages in the short-term and the long-term with three different time periods: 50, 100 and 200 days.
First, we analyse the long-term trends by comparing the 50 days with the 100 days. We see that the SOL price was moving over and under both EMA lines, which indicates weak trend changes throughout most of 2023.
However, the price line makes a breakthrough in October, moving upwards and away from both lines, especially the 200 EMA line, marking an upward trend for the mean.
Additionally, we analyse the 50-day and the 200-day EMA lines to highlight stronger trend changes in the short term. This way, both lines 50-day (blue) and 200-day (yellow) are moving close to each other.
However, the price line is still moving away from both lines and indicating a strong positive trend, sending the price skyrocketing to new highs.
In fact, SOL price closed the 2023 year at $101, after a shaky start in Jan 2023, just under $10. However, the case is different in 2024, as the coin started strong at $101, and despite a slight drop, it bounced back and currently resides in the $115 region.
Solana achieved a +100% price increase by the end of 2023, which is attributed to the overall crypto market recovery. Investors are currently making their bets on how long this surge will last and the Solana price prediction in 2040.SOL is more likely to keep its performance as one of the best altcoins for the next bull run, especially with the increased DeFi and wallet activity, increasing the network utility and improving its ecosystem. However, it is not known how consistent this run will be.