Solana (SOL) is taking the cryptocurrency world by storm. Over the past week, the price of SOL has increased by nearly 30%, temporarily surpassing Binance Coin (BNB) in market cap.
Amid this rise, two major SOL holders, FTX and Alameda, have been put under the spotlight. Will they continue to sell, potentially affecting market dynamics?
At the time of the bankruptcy, FTX and Alameda held SOL 55.8 million, which was estimated to be worth $1.16 billion, according to CoinGecko. SOL is the largest holdings of these companies, followed by Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH).
Only 27% of FTX's total SOL assets (15.3 million SOL) have been unlocked, of which 13.22 million SOL ($666 million) may have been sold. Between October 24 and November 14, 2023, FTX and Alameda deposited SOL 6.99 million ($280 million) into the exchanges from two public SOL addresses.
Another FTX-associated address, “4Axqyo”, also sent 6.23 million SOL ($386 million) to “3vxheE” (presumably Coinbase) over the past month. This means there may be SOL 2.08 million ($206 million) left for direct trading.
The remaining 73% of FTX's total SOL assets (40.5 million SOL, currently valued at $3.99 billion) are still locked and will be released according to the following vesting schedule:
- Approximately 609,000 SOL ($60 million) are unlocked each month, representing approximately 1% of FTX's total SOL assets.
- All 7.5 million SOLs, representing 13.5% of FTX's total SOL assets, will be unlocked on March 1, 2025.
- All 61.8 thousand SOLs will be unlocked on May 17, 2025.
Based on this vesting schedule, FTX and Alameda's SOL sale in the near future is unlikely to significantly impact the market.
Since FTX's bankruptcy on November 11, 2022, the SOL price has increased by 461%, from $17.66 to $99.03. This means FTX creditors could make more than $3 billion more than SOL.
*This is not investment advice.
