Solana’s native cryptocurrency SOL staged an impressive 20% rebound after plummeting to $187 lows on February 3. However, SOL remains 32.7% below its all-time high from Jan. 19 despite recovering slightly above $199. This downturn has weighed on investor sentiment despite the recent memecoin frenzy on Solana.
Nonetheless, VanEck is giving SOL holders some hope. The investment manager has predicted that SOL could be worth $520 by the end of this year.
SOL Price To Reach $520 In 2025
Can Solana top the mythical $520 level this year? VanEck believes it is possible.
In a Thursday post on X, VanEck cites rising demand for smart contract platforms (SCP) and M2 money supply increases in the coming months as key catalysts for a parabolic appreciation in the SOL price.
M2 measures the U.S. money supply, including cash, checking deposits, and readily convertible near-money such as savings and money market funds. Continued growth in the M2 money supply is a bullish factor for risk assets as it signals that more liquidity is entering the system, which usually finds itself in risk assets first.
The investment firm said it predicts the U.S. M2 money supply will hit $22.3 trillion by the end of the year, while the smart contract platform market — where platforms like Solana operate, allowing for the creation and execution of smart contracts — is expected to grow 43% to a record high of $1.1 trillion during this period.
Meanwhile, Solana’s share of the smart contract platform market cap currently stands at 15%, but VanEck sees this rising to 22% by the end of the year. “This projection is supported by Solana’s developer dominance, increasing market share in DEX volumes, revenues, and active users,” the firm’s analysts explained.
“Using an autoregressive (AR) forecast model, we estimate Solana’s market cap will reach ~$250B, implying a SOL price of $520 based on ~486M floating tokens,” VanEck said. An autoregressive (AR) forecast model looks at past data to predict future values.
According to CoinGecko, SOL was trading at $199.05 as of press time, representing a 0.2% gain on the day. To reach a target of $520, the fifth-largest crypto would need to jump by roughly $163% in 2025.
Buzz Around Spot SOL ETF
In the meantime, a potential SOL U.S.-listed exchange-traded fund could significantly impact its price.
VanEck is among a slew of asset managers who submitted paperwork for a Solana exchange-traded fund in 2024. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) had previously refused to acknowledge multiple filings for ETFs tracking SOL due to concerns about the crypto’s categorization as a security.
However, the SEC made a notable step toward greenlighting SOL investment products in the US on Feb. 6 after acknowledging Grayscale’s amended application — in what analysts note is a first for SOL ETFs.