From Euphoric Highs to Today's Sobering Reality

If your SOL bag is feeling particularly heavy these days, you're not alone. Solana has transitioned from its euphoric January highs

Hello dispatchers!

If your SOL bag is feeling particularly heavy these days, you're not alone. Solana has transitioned from its euphoric January highs to today's sobering reality. Plummeting over 50% from its $293 all-time high to as low as $132, and outperforming even ETH (down 18%) with a painful 38% monthly decline, SOL also lost over $22 billion in memecoin market cap and faced a perfect storm of presidential token scandals and protocol wars.

Today we're diving deep into the multiple crises converging on Solana's ecosystem, from Pump.fun's potential betrayal of Raydium to the looming $2 billion token unlock that has even major market makers pulling funds. Is this the end of Solana's memecoin-fuelled rally, or just a violent rotation into its next phase? Let's find out.

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The Damage Report

Fortunes change fast. Even faster in crypto. Less than two months ago, Solana was the golden child of this bull market, reaching a staggering $293 as the TRUMP token launch catapulted the ecosystem to new highs. Today, it's struggling to hold above $140 — a staggering 50% plunge that has surpassed even the broader crypto market's decline.

The carnage isn't limited to SOL's price. The entire Solana ecosystem has felt the tremors. Solana DEX trading volumes dropped to a five-week low of $2.61 billion last week, and Solana's decline this month (38%) has significantly outpaced Ethereum's (18%). What's more, SOL is now at its lowest price point since October 2024, erasing nearly four months of gains.

The irony? The downfall is unfolding just as institutional interest was peaking with hit multiple fund issuers filing applications based on its spot price. Franklin Templeton became the latest asset manager to file for a Solana ETF last week, joining Grayscale, Bitwise, Canary, 21Shares, and VanEck.

Even as the broader crypto market is going through a bloody phase, Solana's pain has been particularly acute. Bitcoin is down roughly 20% from its peak, while Ethereum has shed 19% over the past month. Solana's 38% drop in the same period signals something more than just market correlation.

The question on everyone's mind: what went so terribly wrong for the "Ethereum killer" blockchain that was supposed to lead this bull market?

Presidential Token Disasters

If Solana's current wounds could be traced to one fateful origin, it might be the moment when cryptocurrencies became political playthings. On February 14, Argentine President Javier Milei promoted the Solana-based $LIBRA token on social media, triggering a frenzy that briefly sent the token to a $4.6 billion valuation. Hours later, insiders allegedly siphoned over $107 million worth of liquidity in what Galaxy Digital described as a "rug pull," causing a catastrophic 95% collapse. The fallout was immediate and severe. More than 86% of wallets that bought Milei's memecoin ended up losing money, according to research from Nansen. The scandal triggered political backlash in Argentina, with opponents calling for Milei's impeachment. Milei hastily deleted his promotional posts, claiming he had "little to no knowledge about the token."

This disaster came just weeks after a similar scenario played out with the Trump and Melania tokens on Solana during inauguration weekend. Both tokens initially soared to multi-billion dollar valuations before crashing spectacularly, leaving most investors with massive losses.

Read: When Presidents Play With Memes 🏛️

The repeated pattern of presidential endorsements followed by token crashes severely damaged trust in Solana's ecosystem. As Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, stated after the Libra debacle: "Some memecoins have clearly gone too far," calling on the industry to "purge the bad actors."

The reputational damage extends beyond just the tokens themselves. By hosting these controversial launches, Solana has become associated with what Edward Wilson, marketing lead at DeFi project OneBalance, calls "predatory" products that "prey" on investors.

Block That Quote 🎙️

"When Melania launched after Trump, it brought the realisation home that some teams were purely extractive and really stole the thunder of the Trump launch. The last wave with the Libra coin was the nail in the coffin." — Chris Chung, Founder of Solana trading platform Titan

Chung's analysis cuts to the heart of Solana's current crisis — it wasn't just one presidential token disaster, but the rapid succession of them that revealed a pattern of exploitation that's severely damaged trust in the