Crypto Traders Shocked That Solana Whales Can Dump Their Cheaply Bought SOL Too
A widely shared video from a podcast discussion between several well-known venture capitalists on their investments in Solana ’s native token SOL has raised eyebrows in the crypto community, with many questioning their intentions.
The clip, which belongs to an almost one-month-old episode of the All-in Podcast, featured investors such as Social Capital founder Chamath Palihapitiya and Craft Ventures general partner David Sacks, and only showed a short segment where the investors joked and laughed about each other’s investments into SOL.
Among the questions being asked in the short video were things like “but you’re holding, correct?” to which Palihapitiya answered “ish.” Further in the video, Palihapitiya also asked “do you think I’m buying anything at all without a discount,” before going on to say “everything is a discount.”
The video was retweeted by several members of both the Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) community, with many criticizing the investors for their apparent lack of interest in the project, as well as a lack of concern for other investors who are not necessarily able to buy coins at a discount.
Among the many people who shared the video clip on Twitter was the popular crypto trader @DegenSpartan, who commented that “it is fallacious to ever be thinking that you’re playing on a level playing field with any of the VCs.”
Meanwhile, as pointed out by other Twitter users, the short video clip – less than one minute long – did not give a very good picture of what the discussion between the investors was really about.
In the full version of the video, uploaded on the All-in Podcast’s YouTube channel, a more nuanced discussion could be heard, with the investors talking about the merits of Solana as well their investments in it.
For instance, David Sacks explained how his firm has had exposure to Solana since the protocol’s early days through an investment in the crypto investment firm Multicoin Capital, and that they have now made “about a billion dollars” in returns from the investment.
Moreover, Sacks was also heard saying in the video that there is “a lot of smart money in Silicon Valley that is betting on a flippening where Solana could ultimately overtake Ethereum as the preferred platform [for smart contracts],” and that this has given him the conviction to hold on to the trade.
Ethereum is different from Solana as it is a decentralized network, while Solana experienced a serious outage in September when the network was offline for 17 hours.
Further, speaking about the timeframes of investments like the one in SOL, Chamath Palihapitiya explained that the timeframe depends on whether it is viewed as “an investment or an idea that you love so much,” while adding “if it’s the latter you should never sell.”
And although some investors may feel discouraged by the fact that larger investors got in at discounted prices long before them, some industry observers are still bullish on the future of Solana.
Based on responses from a panel of 50 fintech specialists, a report released by Finder.com on Thursday came up with average price predictions for SOL of USD 235 for the end of 2021, USD 1,178 for the end of 2025, and USD 5,057 for the end of 2030.
At 15:27 UTC, SOL, ranked 4th by market capitalization, traded at USD 239, up almost 6% over the past 24 hours and 30% over the past 7 days.The price skyrocketed by over 16,800% in a year.
SOL price chart:
Worth noting, however, was that the panelists’ predictions varied wildly.Among the most pessimistic was the CEO of the trading platform Coinmama, Sagi Bakshi, who indicated a price of USD 50 in 2030, saying he has “no idea if Solana will survive.”
On the opposite side of the spectrum was Daniel Cawrey, Chief Operating Officer at Cypherpunk Holdings, who predicted a price of USD 20,000 for 2030, saying “it scales better than ether and already has staking .”
Meanwhile, crypto exchange Kraken also noted in a https://kraken.docsend.com/view/e726hn9bfk765ttz today that “SOL has continued to attract increasingly greater attention from new and existing market participants – especially institutions.”
“With SOL appearing to remain in what could be deemed its third wave of ‘price discovery,’ the case could be made that SOL climbs meaningfully higher into the near year,” the report said, suggesting a price target of USD 400 to 500 between December and the first quarter of next year.
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Watch the full episode below:.
