Solana logs 9B transactions as SOL loses $100 – What’s missing?

Is liquidity what’s missing from Solana’s recent weakness?

From a technical perspective, SOL has performed extremely poorly in October, falling over 15%. The asset has seen its market cap fall by more than $10 billion to $58 billion and its price has fallen below the key $100 level. This may cause more panic selling to occur as macro uncertainty grows.

However, is this weakness being caused by the overall altcoin market falling against Bitcoin, or “Solana-specific” outflows? The chart suggests that capital is flowing out of the altcoins overall with SOL/BTC down over 11% so far this month. That puts it on track for the worst monthly performance since November 2025.

In essence, Solana’s recent weakness looks more macro-driven than network-driven.

This is backed up by data from Token Terminal which shows that Solana has already executed over 9 billion transactions this month alone, with activity holding near the 10 billion mark. This suggests on-chain activity remains strong despite the price correction, potentially setting up an “undervaluation” opportunity for SOL if market sentiment flips back to risk-on.

So, the key question is: Could a shift back to risk-on sentiment trigger Solana’s [SOL] next recovery?

Solana underperforms as falling DeFi liquidity adds to selling pressure

Strong on-chain liquidity is usually a sign of healthy fundamentals for any L1.

However, Solana itself paints a different picture. SOL’s Total Value Locked (TVL) has fallen by 10.28% from $6.42 billion to $5.76 billion. This comes compared to ETH which has seen its TVL fall by 8.42% from $95 billion to $87 billion. This indicates that liquidity is flowing out of Solana more quickly than Ethereum.

To add to the pressure, Solana stablecoin market cap has been declining since its peak of $16 billion in early October. Despite high on-chain activity, users are not pushing more capital into the chain. It is evident in the falling TVL and stablecoin liquidity. Even though there is high user activity on Solana, less capital is being locked up and used within the DeFi ecosystem which may be causing downward pressure on SOL.

In essence, Solana’s weakness goes beyond broader market pressure.

This indicates that there are more headwinds specific to Solana, as there is less capital being put into DeFi and therefore the SOL underperformance could be due to this lack of liquidity. Until the capital flows stabilize and new liquidity enters the market, SOL could continue to face downward pressure even if on-chain transaction activity remains strong.

Final Summary

• SOL drops over 15% in October, falling below $100.

• Falling TVL and stablecoin liquidity add to SOL’s selling pressure despite strong network activity.