Solana poised for gains fueled by US ETF and retail adoption — Analyst
This article has been updated to include a paragraph on Solana’s market capitalization compared to BTC and ETH.
Solana is positioned for another year of significant growth in 2025, driven by increasing interest from retail investors and anticipation of a US-based Solana exchange-traded fund (ETF).
SOL/USD, 1-month chart. Source: Cointelegraph
Despite the current correction, Solana is poised for a year of significant financial returns, which will mainly be driven by retail investors’ profit expectations, Nicolai Søndergaard, research analyst at Nansen, told Cointelegraph during an exclusive interview at the Emergence Prague 2024 event.
“[Solana’s appeal] is the function of expected profits. It’s that Solana seems cheaper. If you’re looking at a unit, you just think this is cheaper to buy,” Søndergaard said.
New retail investors often make the mistake of using a cryptocurrency’s per-unit price to determine its value and future potential, which is much more dependent on the coin’s market capitalization.
However, a token’s market capitalization may provide more accurate information on the token’s total value, its adoption compared to other cryptocurrencies and its potential price volatility.
Solana’s market capitalization was $92 billion at the time of writing, more than four times smaller than Ether’s $397 billion and nearly 20 times smaller than Bitcoin’s leading $1.8 trillion market capitalization
SOL ETFs await approval by the end of January 2025
The deadline for Grayscale’s Solana ETF application is Jan. 23, while the four other applicants expect a preliminary decision by Jan. 25, 45 days after the SEC formally accepted the ETF application for review in November 2024.
Nansen’s Nicolai Søndergaard, interview with Cointelegraph’s Zoltan Vardai
While a Solana ETF is highly likely for approval during 2025, the timeline remains the main question for crypto investors, according to Nansen’s Søndergaard:
“The question is if it’s going to take a lot of iterations before it goes through, similar to what happened with BTC and ETH. But I think it’s definitely happening in 2025.”
