Solana prices have spent much of today trading reasonably close to $100, fluctuating near this level but failing to mount the strength needed to break through it.
SOL, which serves as the native token of the high-performance Solana network, rallied to $99.16 earlier today, CoinMarketCap figures show.
After rising to this point, where it was less than 1% away from reaching the $100 level, which some analysts have singled out as significant, the cryptocurrency fell back somewhat, but still managed to retain most of its recent gains, trading primarily north of $97 until roughly noon, additional CoinMarketCap data reveals.
While the altcoin suffered additional losses over the next several hours, it managed to mount a recovery later on, trading at roughly $97 at the time of this writing.
“Solana is generally seen as an even-better protocol than Ethereum for major uses of crypto including decentralized finance,” said Joe DiPasquale, CEO of cryptocurrency hedge fund manager BitBull Capital.
“The usage of the solana protocol has remained high, leading it to be an investor favorite. But, $100 remains a major resistance line both in the technical analysis and psychologically,” he observed.
“Although we expect the price of Solana to appreciate, we were not surprised to see investors selling at $100 as it consolidates before approaching that line again,” said DiPasquale.
He was not alone in singling out the $100 level, as Armando Aguilar, an independent cryptocurrency analyst, also identified it as being a price where significant selling pressure has accumulated.
Earlier this month, he described the market’s rejection of that particular price level as “ongoing,” stating that traders had been placing sustained selling pressure on the digital currency after it experienced some very compelling gains in the final quarter of 2023.
Right around Christmas, the digital asset surpassed $120, reaching its highest level since April 2022 on CoinMarketCap.
Since then, the price of SOL has declined significantly, falling below $80 right around January 23, having lose roughly one-third of its value.
Following this decline, several analysts stated that the digital asset’s price had become a bit inflated.
Tim Enneking, managing director of Digital Capital Management, took this point of view.
“Sol, like most of the rest of the crypto market, was terribly overbought leading into the spot BTC ETF approvals,” he stated, adding that the upward pressure was compounded by a relief rally related to the lifting of the FTX debacle.
However, he described the market as “oversold” following its recent pullback, emphasizing that it had yet to be seen how much cryptocurrency prices would recover as the so-called halving approached.
While the digital currency markets are notoriously volatile, several analysts expressed bullish sentiment surrounding the Solana network and its native digital currency.
One of these market observers is Brett Munster, who serves as a Portfolio Manager for Blockforce Capital.
“Solana has a lot of momentum heading into the rest of the year,” he noted.
“The Firedancer client is expected to be released in the first half of this year and should significantly improve the performance of the network,” said Munster.
“Stablecoin usage on Solana is growing and Solana has emerged as the chain of choice for many of the top DePIN projects.”
Disclosure: I own some bitcoin, bitcoin cash, litecoin, ether, EOS and SOL.
