Solana Price Forecast – Can SOL-USD Defend $120 After Losing the $140–$145 Zone?

Solana (SOL-USD) at $127: high-beta L1 caught between ETF demand and a technical break

Solana trades around $127–$129 after losing the $142–$145 band and printing a two-week low near $130. Daily performance is roughly -3% to -4%, weekly loss about 8%, with 24-hour spot volume down to roughly $3.9B after a 24% slide. The move came together with about $390M in crypto liquidations, including roughly $59M in Solana longs versus just $1.4M in shorts, which is a clean flush of leveraged bulls.

On the daily chart, RSI near 47 shows momentum neutral but leaning weak. MACD has crossed below its signal line and the histogram is negative, confirming that the prior up-leg from the $120s–$140s is losing energy. On the 4-hour chart the picture is harsher: RSI around 24 pushes SOL-USD into oversold territory in the short term, with MACD still pointing down. Price sits below the 20- and 50-day EMAs and well under the 100-day SMA near $149 and 200-day SMA around $172, both now overhead resistance after a bearish crossover. Technically this is not a healthy trend; it is a weak asset leaning on support.

Macro structure: $120 neckline, $75–$80 measured risk and the path from $293

On the larger timeframe, several analysts are treating the last two years of SOL-USD as a developing head-and-shoulders structure. The “head” is the $293 peak from early 2025, the left and right shoulders are the mid-2024 and late-2025 rallies, and the neckline runs roughly around $120. As long as that neckline holds, the pattern remains theoretical. A decisive daily close below $120 with follow-through volume would validate it and unlock a measured move down toward the $75–$80 area, roughly a 35–40% drawdown from current levels and about 70% below the ATH.

Between here and that structural break there are several layered supports. The first is $132, which already acted as an intraday floor. The second is the psychological and liquidity shelf at $130 where a recent low printed. Below that, prior local lows and liquidity pockets sit around $122 and then $115. The market is now oscillating in the $128–$135 band directly above these levels, which means any acceleration to the downside can push SOL-USD quickly into the low-$120s.

On the upside, short-term resistance stands at $135, then $136, essentially the 50% retracement of the $143 → $130 drop. Above that, the important pivots are $140, then the prior rejection zone at $144–$147, followed by $150 and $160. Until SOL-USD reclaims and holds $140–$145 on closing basis, the macro pattern remains vulnerable and the trend is classed as corrective rather than impulsive.

Derivatives positioning: open interest fall, negative funding and scope for a squeeze

Futures data confirms that leverage has been reset. Open interest sits around $8.2B, down roughly 7% as price broke below $135 and then $130. That OI flush came with the $59M in long liquidations versus $1.38M in short liquidations, which is a wide imbalance and shows longs were the side forced out.

Funding rates near -0.0004% signal that shorts are now paying less, and in some venues receiving, to stay in position; the short side holds the initiative. This combination of lower open interest, negative funding and a weak spot trend is classic late-stage liquidation behaviour inside a down-leg rather than the beginning of a collapse. If spot can reclaim $135–$140 while funding stays negative, the setup for a short squeeze toward $145–$150 becomes attractive. If instead price bleeds below $130 with funding flipping positive, it would mean shorts are starting to cover and fresh late longs are entering at the wrong time, which usually precedes another leg down.

Institutional flows into Solana ETFs: strong multi-week demand with first signs of fatigue

Despite the technical stress, the ETF tape for Solana is not bearish. U.S. spot Solana ETFs have recorded around $46–$49M in net inflows over the last week alone, marking roughly the ninth straight week of positive flow. Cumulative net inflows since launch are around $876M across products such as BSOL, FSOL, QSOL, VSOL and others, which is substantial institutional capital for a single altcoin.

There are, however, hints that this bid is no longer one-way. Some datasets show recent net outflows on the margin, which likely reflect profit-taking and de-risking as SOL-USD slipped back under $140 and the broader market sold off. The important point is the net picture: hundreds of millions in inflow over months versus tens of millions in short-term outflow. Multi-week trend still favours accumulation, but the market has stopped rewarding late ETF buyers above $140–$145, so their risk tolerance around the $120 neckline will be critical. If ETFs flip to persistent net outflows while price loses $120, downside acceleration will likely be sharper.

On-chain fundamentals: $14.8B in stablecoins, $1B in RWAs and $100B monthly DEX volume

Fundamentally, Solana’s chain data looks more like an aggressive growth asset than a failing network. Stablecoin float on Solana has climbed roughly 12.4% in a week to about $14.85B, a level that rivals or exceeds most other non-Ethereum L1s. That number reflects active capital sitting on chain and is one of the strongest leading indicators for future DeFi and trading activity.

Real-world-asset (RWA) tokenization has passed $1B in TVL on Solana, making it the third major chain to cross that threshold after Ethereum (around $12.3B) and BNB Chain (roughly $2B). Rough figures show about $255M in BlackRock’s on-chain BUILD fund and approximately $176M in Ondo’s tokenized yield products deployed on Solana. On top of that, stable yields tied to tokenized Treasuries and cash equivalents are deepening liquidity pools and producing fee flows to validators and DeFi protocols.

DEX volume is heavy: roughly $100B transacted on Solana DEXs over the last 30 days, more than Ethereum and BSC combined over the same period according to the data excerpt. Network fees over the last month exceeded $17M, which, despite Solana’s low individual transaction fees, signals massive transactional throughput. Unique active addresses over the last 30 days have been quoted north of 60M, indicating that usage is not dominated by a handful of whales. This combination of stablecoin depth, RWA TVL, DEX turnover and active addresses underpins the long-term use case even as secondary-market price corrects.

**NYSE tokenization platform and TradFi experiments: indirect but meaningful tailwind for SOL-USD

The New York Stock Exchange has announced a blockchain-based platform for tokenized securities, designed for 24/7 trading, instant settlement and dollar-denominated transactions using stablecoins. The platform will leverage NYSE’s Pillar matching engine and is currently in the process of seeking SEC approval, with launch targeted for later this year.

Solana is not named as the execution layer for this platform, but the direction is clear: traditional capital markets are moving toward 24/7 tokenized rails. In that environment the chains with proven high throughput, deep stablecoin liquidity and institutional RWA use cases are positioned to capture part of that flow. Solana’s $1B+ RWA TVL and $14.85B stablecoin base, together with ventures like Western Union’s stablecoin settlement project scheduled for first-half 2026, place it on the short list of credible settlement layers. The immediate price impact is limited; the structural implication is that SOL-USD is tied to a narrative far larger than retail speculation.

Network growth catalysts: Alpenglow, privacy hackathons and enterprise pipelines

On the technical side, the upcoming Alpenglow upgrade in Q1 is built to cut finality times and further improve throughput, reducing latency for DeFi, trading and real-time settlement. Faster, more predictable finality directly benefits market-structure use cases like DEXs, RFQ engines and eventually tokenized securities.

Developer activity remains strong. A privacy-focused hackathon launched on January 12 with up to $75,000 in prizes is targeting zero-knowledge applications, confidential DeFi and privacy-preserving infrastructure on Solana. That sits on top of a developer base that is already shipping RWA, DePIN and payments products.

On the enterprise side, Western Union plans to roll out a stablecoin-based settlement platform on Solana in the coming months, a signal that large incumbents are willing to trust the chain for core operations. Together with spot ETFs, these initiatives show that Solana is transitioning from a “fast DeFi chain” into a broader transactional base layer for retail, institutions and tokenized assets.

Macro and regulatory headwinds: Supreme Court tariffs, dollar strength and 80% volatility

Macro risk is not neutral. Bitcoin has slipped below $90,000, Ethereum trades around $3,000, and the whole crypto complex is down about 2–3% over 24 hours in the latest data you provided. At the same time, a pending U.S. Supreme Court decision on Trump-era tariffs could re-ignite inflation concerns and push the dollar higher if the Court backs aggressive tariff policy. That scenario typically weighs on high-beta risk assets, especially those with ~80% historical volatility like SOL-USD.

If tariffs are upheld and the dollar rallies, flows can rotate out of crypto and into assets like tokenized gold, which is already seeing record volumes with the metal near $4,700–$4,800. For Solana, this means that even strong network fundamentals can be overwhelmed in the short term by macro de-risking. The same macro driver that may eventually support tokenization volumes can first pressure L1 valuations.

Regulatory risk also extends to ETFs and tokenization. If the SEC tightens its stance on crypto-linked securities following the NYSE initiative, flows into Solana ETFs and RWA products could flatten or reverse. None of this is in the price yet; the market is trading technicals and leverage much more than long-dated regulatory scenarios, but it adds a risk premium to any valuation.

Key technical map for Solana (SOL-USD): zones that matter

The current price around $127–$129 is sitting just above an important multi-week support band at $128–$130. The first upside checkpoint is $135, where intraday rallies are stalling. Clearing $135–$136 would mean reclaiming the 50% retracement of the $143 → $130 swing. Above that, the $140 level coincides with a descending trendline on the intraday chart and is backed by the $142–$145 cluster where the last rejection started. A daily close above $145 would tell you that the breakdown failed and that the market is willing to test $150 and then $160 again.

On the downside, $132, $130, $122 and $115 are the relevant shelves. A clean break and daily close below $130 puts $122 in play. Losing $122 makes a test of the $115 zone likely. Only below $120 does the long-term head-and-shoulders neckline break and the $75–$80 measured move become a live scenario instead of a theoretical chart pattern. All of this unfolds with price still below the 100-day SMA at about $149 and the 200-day SMA near $172, which means that any move back into the $150–$170 band is, for now, a counter-trend rally inside a broader corrective phase.

Strategic verdict: Buy, Sell or Hold for Solana (SOL-USD) at $127?

Putting the pieces together, SOL-USD at roughly $127 combines:

– a weak short-term technical picture with a real risk of a break under $120,
– a derivatives market that has already flushed many leveraged longs,
– multi-week net ETF inflows close to $900M,
– chain fundamentals that show $14.85B in stablecoins, $1B+ in RWA TVL, about $100B in 30-day DEX volume and tens of millions of active addresses,
– plus structural catalysts from the Alpenglow upgrade, Western Union settlement, the privacy hackathon and a broader tokenization trend signaled by NYSE.

For a risk-tolerant, diversified crypto portfolio, that balance skews more toward a speculative Buy than a Sell or a neutral Hold. The asymmetric part of the setup is clear: upside scenarios include a return to $145, then $160, and, if macro conditions ease and ETF flows remain strong, a later attempt at the $200–$300 corridor. Downside risk, if $120 fails decisively, extends toward $100 first and potentially $75–$80 as a full pattern target.

A disciplined way to read this is straightforward. Above $135–$140, the market begins to validate the bullish ETF and on-chain story. Above $145, SOL-USD starts to transition out of “technical break risk” into “consolidation with upside bias.” Below $120, the chart stops arguing and simply tells you the asset is in a deeper bear phase, regardless of fundamentals.

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