Thomas Daniels
A prominent Solana investor has secured substantial gains from a long-term staking strategy, underscoring the potential profitability of patient investment in the cryptocurrency market.
In 2021, the investor staked approximately 991,079 SOL tokens when the price was around $27 per token, amounting to an initial investment of about $27 million. Over four years, the staked holdings grew to 1.29 million SOL. With Solana’s price appreciating to approximately $140, the total value of these holdings reached around $180 million.
On April 22, 2025, the investor began realizing profits by unstaking and transferring 100,000 SOL tokens, worth roughly $14 million, to Binance. This action suggests an intent to sell a portion of the holdings. Despite this, the investor still retains 1.19 million SOL, valued at approximately $166 million, resulting in an unrealized profit of about $153 million.
This activity reflects a broader trend among large Solana holders. Earlier in April, four wallets that had collectively staked $37 million worth of SOL in 2021 unlocked their tokens, which had appreciated to over $206 million. Subsequently, approximately $50 million worth of these tokens were sold.
Additionally, on April 20, 2025, Solana briefly surpassed Ethereum in total staked value, reaching over $53.9 billion across more than 505,000 unique wallets. This milestone was driven by Solana’s higher staking yield of 8.31% compared to Ethereum’s 2.98%. However, some analysts caution that such high staking rates might divert resources from decentralized finance (DeFi) activities, potentially impacting the broader ecosystem.
These developments underscore the significant returns achievable through long-term staking strategies in the cryptocurrency space, while also highlighting the complex dynamics between staking incentives and ecosystem growth.
