Solana (SOL) surged over 6% on April 4 after PayPal announced support for Solana and Chainlink on its digital platforms. The news came just hours after large holders, known as whales, sold tens of millions in unlocked SOL tokens, causing the price to fall sharply.
PayPal Announces Solana Support, Price Jumps
In a press release, PayPal confirmed that Solana (SOL) and Chainlink (LINK) are now available for users to buy, hold, sell, and transfer through PayPal and Venmo. The service is currently accessible to users in the United States.
Offering more tokens on PayPal and Venmo provides users with greater flexibility, choice, and access to digital currencies. Said May Zabaneh, Vice President of Product for Blockchain, Crypto, and Digital Currencies at PayPal.
Before the PayPal news, Solana had dropped nearly 13% in value. On April 2, the token reached a high of $131.11. By early April 4, it had fallen to $113.83.
As seen in the chart, Solana’s price declined steadily throughout the day before rebounding sharply following the PayPal news, closing at $120.58, up 6.11% in 24 hours.
Whale Sell-Off Followed a $200M Token Unlock
The price drop was driven by heavy selling from whales who had just unlocked large amounts of staked SOL. In April 2021, four whale addresses staked around 1.79 million SOL tokens, worth about $37.7 million at that time. These tokens were locked for four years as part of a long-term staking plan. On April 4, the tokens were finally unlocked. According to Arkham Intelligence, this was the largest single-day unlock of staked SOL tokens in Solana’s history.
Notably, when whales unlocked their tokens, the prices had grown in value to about $206 million—showing a 446% increase since they were first staked.
Right after the unlock, whales began selling their tokens. Blockchain data shows that over 420,000 SOL tokens, worth nearly $50 million, were already sold. One whale address alone dumped nearly 260,000 SOL, worth over $30 million. Three other wallets sold about $16 million in SOL combined.
Even after the selling, the four wallets still hold around 1.38 million SOL, valued at roughly $160 million.
Additionally, this whale activity followed another major unlocking by FTX and Alameda Research, the bankrupt exchange and its affiliate trading firm. On March 4, they unstaked 3 million SOL, worth $431 million. Since November 2023, FTX has unstaked 7.83 million SOL and sold them for $986 million, according to Spot On Chain.