Solana price rose to twelve-week highs on Thursday, going against a market-wide struggle to stay on course for a third successive day of gains. The crypto coin traded at $173.36 at the time of writing, with gains of 1.5 percent on the daily chart. Solana has gained 12 percent in the last week, pointing to a bullish hold of the momentum.
The crypto market has struggled this week, following Bitcoin’s rejection near the $70k mark. However, Solana has remained on the ascending trajectory. Solana price has been influenced by two key events in October. First, the project implemented the Firedancer upgrade, which took place in late September, has improved the transaction speed and scalability in the network.
Network congestion is one of the leading limiters that have previously prevented Solana from achieving its optimal growth. Secondly, Solana undertook a token unlock event, in which 524 million SOL tokens entered circulation. This has helped improve liquidity in the ecosystem, in time for the uptick in the global crypto market momentum.
One of the criticisms against Solana is the disproportional large percentage of the token supply held by the Solana Foundation, the founding team and early investors. This has raised questions on whether the Solana ecosystem is truly decentralised. Also, the token unlock has implications on the Solana price inflation rate, which currently stands at 4.952 percent.
Ultimately, Solana hopes to reduce the rate by 15 percent per year until it achieves a stable rate of 1.5 percent. The October token unlock represents 0.11 percent of the total SOL supply, which is significant.
Solana price prediction
Solana price pivots at 169.25, and the upside will be in play if the price action stays above that mark. The upward momentum is likely to encounter initial resistance at 174.90, but an extended control by the buyers could breach that barrier and test 179.75.
On the other hand, the sellers will be in control if the price breaks below 169.25. In that case, the crypto coin could find the first support at 165.95. However, if the sellers extend their control, it could strengthen the downward momentum to break below the first support and render the upside narrative invalid. Meanwhile, the price could decline to test the second support at 162.70.
