Price of Solana by end of 2026?

Solana anticipates significant institutional growth and ETP AUM doubling by Q3 2026. The network is projected to experience sustained and accelerating institutional adoption throughout 2026, with assets under management (AUM) in Solana-focused Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) potentially doubling by the end of Q3. This growth is primarily attributed to the successful deployment of the 'Alpenglow' network upgrade in Q1 2026, which is expected to enhance network throughput and stability, thereby directly addressing critical concerns for institutional investors. Further solidifying the case for capital allocation, robust on-chain activity was observed, including an 81% jump in network fees and a 62% rise in active addresses by February 2026.

Solana's liquid staking TVL shows explosive growth, attracting institutional interest. The Total Value Locked (TVL) within Solana's liquid staking sector has already seen explosive growth, increasing 217% year-over-year. Marinade Finance is strategically positioned to capture institutional capital through its 'Marinade Select' offering, which experienced an 87.13% growth in SOL-denominated TVL in the six months leading to January 2026. Conversely, Jito's market share has declined from 35% to just over 20% due to intense competitive pressure, despite its innovative MEV-enhanced yield model. The emergence of new protocols such as Sanctum is fundamentally reshaping the market by facilitating a diverse ecosystem of Liquid Staking Tokens (LSTs), contributing to market fragmentation and fostering LST-fi innovation.

Firedancer significantly enhanced Solana's performance and network stability. In the first half of 2026, following its full mainnet launch, the Firedancer validator client substantially improved Solana's operational capabilities. During a high-volume stress event in March 2026, the network achieved a peak sustained non-voted transactions per second (TPS) of 285,000, maintaining this for a continuous 20-minute window, with burst throughput exceeding 450,000 TPS. This performance was largely attributed to Firedancer's optimized C++ architecture. Crucially, Solana maintained 100% uptime throughout H1 2026, extending its period of stability to over two years, a significant improvement resulting from the client diversity introduced by Firedancer.

Strong network performance positively impacted Solana's market perception and valuation. This flawless network performance in H1 2026 served as a powerful de-risking event for market participants. Analysis of prediction markets indicated a tangible positive shift, with the implied probability of Solana (SOL) reaching a price target above $600 by the end of 2026 increasing by approximately 25% following the March stress event. This shift suggests that the market is now actively pricing in Solana's technological maturation and reliability as a core thesis for its valuation, thereby transitioning the narrative from addressing reliability issues to leveraging hyper-performance.

Dormant Solana capital strategically accumulated during Q4 2025 downturn. In Q4 2025, institutional-grade capital demonstrated strategic accumulation of Solana (SOL) despite a broad market downturn and a significant price fall for the asset. Solana investment products recorded approximately $420 million in net inflows during November 2025, contrasting with outflows observed from Bitcoin and Ethereum. This indicates that large, previously dormant or newly allocated capital pools, identified as "whale" entities (holding >100,000 SOL), were accumulating SOL at depressed prices, thereby setting the stage for their future re-entry.

Early 2026 saw massive re-entry of accumulated capital. By early 2026, coinciding with an exhaustion of market-wide profit-taking, Solana experienced an unprecedented network revival, signaling a substantial re-entry of previously dormant capital into the active ecosystem. Daily active addresses surged to 3.78 million, and weekly transaction volumes reached a record high of 910.2 million in January. This explosion in on-chain activity, alongside a robust rebound in Total Value Locked (TVL) from a low of $1.1 billion to $9 billion, provides strong evidence that the capital accumulated in late 2025 was actively deployed on-chain.

Re-entry suggests sustained price appreciation for Solana through 2026. The re-entry of this dormant capital significantly impacts market structure by reducing liquid supply as SOL is locked in DeFi protocols, creating a potential supply shock. This shift also reconfigures the holder profile towards stronger, long-term investors who are less prone to selling. This on-chain resurgence is considered a potent leading indicator for sustained price appreciation for Solana through 2026 and into early 2027, suggesting a transition into a markup phase driven by a supply squeeze and a powerful on-chain economic engine.

The Solana (SOL) options market for the December 2026 expiry consistently prices puts higher, reflecting downside protection demand. A persistent negative 25-delta risk reversal skew is evident, indicating that out-of-the-money put options command higher implied volatility compared to equivalent call options. This structural feature demonstrates a continuous market-wide willingness to pay a premium for downside protection, even during periods of significant price appreciation, such as when SOL reached an all-time high near $295 in January 2025. This trend is further corroborated by recent bearish signals in derivatives markets as of February 2026, which show negative funding rates and a long-to-short ratio below 1.0, implying that short positions currently outnumber long positions.

This persistent negative skew reveals cautious optimism, stemming from hedging against volatility. It reflects a nuanced market sentiment best characterized as cautious optimism, consistently hedged against systemic risk. The primary drivers include institutional-scale hedging by large SOL holders managing risk associated with the asset's known high volatility, alongside a pervasive pricing in of broader macroeconomic uncertainties, given the increasing correlation between cryptocurrencies and traditional macro markets. For the prediction market concerning Solana's price at the end of 2026, this implies a "fat left tail" in the probability distribution. This assigns a non-trivial probability to severe drawdowns and suggests a perceived cap on extreme upside potential, indicating that any upward path is likely to be punctuated by significant volatility.

Most of FTX's Solana (SOL) holdings have already been liquidated. The FTX estate has largely completed the liquidation of its substantial Solana (SOL) holdings, having sold approximately 41 million SOL through over-the-counter (OTC) auctions to institutional buyers. These sales generated between $2.9 billion and $3.3 billion for the estate, albeit at significant discounts to prevailing market prices. As of late 2025, the estate's remaining direct SOL inventory has been reduced to approximately 5.05 million SOL, a substantial portion of which is held in staked or locked positions.

The estate will likely complete SOL liquidation before September 2026. This is overwhelmingly probable given the manageable size of the remaining direct SOL holdings and the next major creditor distribution scheduled for around March 31, 2026. The Solana market has demonstrated robust absorption capacity, with daily trading volumes consistently in the $3 billion to $10 billion range. Furthermore, a high staking ratio of 67-69% reduces immediately tradeable supply, providing a structural buffer against potential supply shocks.

Remaining SOL sales anticipate minimal market price impact. The final 5.05 million SOL is expected to be sold in early 2026. This will likely occur through a smaller OTC auction with an estimated 3-8% discount, or, more probably, via on-market algorithmic execution. For algorithmic sales, the projected slippage is anticipated to be only 0.5-2% below the average market's Volume-Weighted Average Price (VWAP) over the sale period. This minimal impact is attributed to the market's deep liquidity and a strong institutional bid that acts as a backstop, preventing significant price degradation.

Solana's future is heavily influenced by anticipated technical upgrades designed to enhance network performance and utility. The Firedancer upgrade, expected in the first half of 2026, aims to dramatically boost transaction throughput beyond 1 million transactions per second and improve network resilience. Furthermore, the Alpenglow consensus upgrade, planned for Q4 2025 or early Q1 2026, is set to reduce transaction finality to an ultra-fast 100-150 milliseconds, making Solana highly attractive for high-frequency financial applications. Additionally, the SIMD-0266 proposal, scheduled for late 2026, will introduce a P-token standard designed to significantly reduce resource usage and boost token performance on the network. Beyond technical advancements, increased institutional adoption, evidenced by substantial Solana-based ETF inflows, and evolving regulatory clarity in major jurisdictions throughout 2025 and 2026 could drive further demand for SOL. Conversely, potential network outages or unforeseen technical issues remain significant risks, echoing past instabilities that have undermined confidence. Intensified regulatory crackdowns or unfavorable legislation, rather than clarity, could deter investment. Competition from other high-performance blockchains and a broader crypto market downturn due to macroeconomic headwinds, such as high inflation or shifts in Federal Reserve interest rate policies, also pose significant downside risks. Declining retail or developer interest and centralization concerns would also be bearish signals. Specific regulatory deadlines, such as UK FCA consultations in early 2026, will be closely watched for their impact on market sentiment.