The long-awaited debut of spot Solana ETFs in the US attracted solid demand, according to analysts – but you wouldn’t know it judging by SOL price action.
The token, which hit a high of $205 a day before last Tuesday’s ETF launch, has fallen 20% to $165 in a week. It has well underperformed the already weak action of crypto major bitcoin and ether which fell around 6% and 12% respectively.
All that happened despite Solana-based exchange-traded products booking their second-biggest weekly net inflows last week at $421 million, according to a CoinShares report.
Vetle Lunde, head of research at K33, described ETFs’ first week as “very solid”, adding that it was all the more commendable compared to the large outflows from BTC and ETH counterparts.
“The launch of US spot Solana ETFs has been a clear success, drawing strong investor demand despite broader outflows from crypto funds,” Lunde said in a note.
Most of the inflow went to Bitwise’s Solana ETF (BSOL), which attracted about $199 million in fresh funding and launched with nearly $223 million in seed capital, according to Farside Investors data.
That $421 million total made BSOL the top crypto ETF of the week, surpassing even BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), which saw subdued demand as bitcoin’s price continued to slide, CoinShares data showed.
The other Solana ETF, Grayscale’s Solana Trust (GSOL), by contrast, pulled in just $2.2 million. Still, it entered the market with $102 million in assets under management after converting from an existing closed-end product.
GSOL charges an administration fee of 0.35% – much lower than the 1.5% fee charged on their flagship bitcoin or ether products, GBTC and ETHE. However, Bitwise undercut that with a 0.20% fee on BSOL.
“BSOL’s lower fees and first-mover advantage have fueled its rapid growth, while GSOL’s higher costs and later debut have dampened the approach,” noted K33’s Lunde.
