Altcoin favourites. What explains the SOL and LINK rally?

As a rule, together with the rise of Bitcoin the rest of the market follows with a small lag. However two altcoins — Solana (SOL) and Chainlink (LINK) — even managed to outpace the leading cryptocurrency over the week.

SOL Rally

Over the past seven days the Solana token jumped 30.7%, according to CoinGecko. At the time of writing the asset trades at $29.42 with a market capitalisation of $12.4 billion.

SOL nearly reached November 2022 levels. The asset stood around $36, but after the FTX collapse it slumped sharply.

In recent months the crypto community had feared a crash of the token amid possible liquidations of the bankrupt platform. In September a court allowed FTX and Alameda to begin selling digital assets worth $3.4 billion. The tranche included $1.16 billion in SOL — the exchange was the largest holder of the token.

Against the backdrop of the sell-off, analysts at Matrixport Technologies forecast a drop to $10-15.

“FUD around Alameda’s sale proved less severe than expected,” said Lukas Outumuro, head of research at IntoTheBlock, in an interview with CoinDesk.

According to on-chain data, on 14 October FTX blocked around 5.5 million SOL in staking worth $122 million, softening trader sentiment.

The analyst also noted SOL’s breakthrough in the ETH pair, which could have contributed to the rally.

Solana-focused funds posted inflows of $15.5 million versus $3.4 million a week earlier, according to CoinShares.

Head of research James Butterfill said this was the largest volume since March 2022, as SOL has