Solana Whales Sell $50M in Tokens After 446% Gain
1min read Solana whales have begun selling their tokens following a significant staking unlock event. In April 2021, four whale addresses staked 1.79 million Solana (SOL) tokens, valued at approximately $37.7 million at the time. These tokens were unlocked on April 4, marking what Arkham Intelligence described as the largest single-day unlock of staked SOL. The next comparable unlock is not anticipated until 2028.
At the time of the unlock, the tokens were worth around $206 million, reflecting a 446% increase from their initial staking value. Following the unlock, the whales started to liquidate their holdings. According to Arkham data, over 420,000 SOL tokens, valued at about $50 million, had been unstaked by the four Solana wallets. Blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain reported that one wallet address sold nearly 260,000 SOL tokens worth over $30 million, while three other wallets offloaded approximately $16 million in SOL.
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Despite the significant sell-off, the four wallets still hold about 1.38 million SOL tokens, valued at roughly $160 million. This event follows a notable decrease in SOL token prices since April 2. On April 2, SOL reached a high of $131.11, but by the time of writing, it had dropped to $114.66, representing a 12% decline over two days.
The recent SOL unlock by the whales comes on the heels of another large unlock by the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX and its trading arm, Alameda Research. On March 4, FTX and Alameda wallets unstaked over 3 million Solana tokens, valued at approximately $431 million. This was FTX’s largest SOL unlock since it began selling its tokens in November 2023. According to data from the analysis platform Spot On Chain, since November 2023, the bankrupt crypto exchange has unstaked 7.83 million SOL tokens, which were sold for $986 million at an average price of $125.80 per SOL.
