As of 10:00 London time today, the exchange rate of sol to pounds was 1 SOL ≈ 118.5 GBP. The 24-hour trading volume was 520 million pounds, an increase of 7.3% from yesterday. The fluctuation range was 112.8-123.6 GBP, with an amplitude of 8.9%. It is driven by multiple factors: the most minimal spread (0.12%) is held by Coinbase’s SOL/GBP pair, whilst Binance, due to its liquidity excess (210 million pounds 24-hour trading volume), posts at 118.3-119.1 GBP, and the arbitrage profit is limited by the 0.4-second cross-exchange transfer rate of the Solana blockchain. If it is done on the DEX Jupiter in an on-chain trade, median slippage is 0.03% (size of the pool = 180 million pounds) and Gas fee is just 0.0001 SOL (roughly 0.012 GBP). This increases the efficiency compared to the 25 pounds cross-border remittance mean cost charged by traditional banks by 99.95%.
Technical indicators suggest that the RSI of SOL/GBP is 55 (neutral range), the MACD bar chart has remained red for three days in a row, and the Bollinger Bands have tightened up to 9.2 GBP (the volatility has fallen by 18% month-on-month). If the resistance of 123.6 GBP (July 2024 high) is broken, the quantitative model shows an uptrend probability of 62% with the target price being 130 GBP. If it breaks the 30-day moving average support of 113.2 GBP, it can trigger an 8% pullback. In derivatives’ market, Bitget’s SOL/GBP green contract funding rate is 0.05% (longs are in control), and open interest increases by 34% each week to £140 million. Deribit’s 125 GBP call option position makes up 41%, betting on the probability of a rise within the month.
Ecological events have a strong correlation with market sentiment. The Solana chain’s DeFi TVL went up 12% this week to £5.4 billion, led by the £86 million SOL-GBP pool on pound stablecoin protocol Cashio, which offered a 0.015% slippage guarantee that attracted market maker Wintermute to carry out one £4.7 million carry trade with an annual yield of 38%. Visa’s Solana-based cross-border pound settlement system, tested in July (with one transaction taking 2 seconds and costing 0.3 GBP), is ready to go live. Institutions are projecting that the exchange rate of sols to pounds can be increased by 1.5% for each 1 billion pounds of settlement need.
Macroeconomics and exchange rate volatility indirectly exert pressure. The UK yearly CPI declined to 3.4% in July, though the core CPI remained at 4.6%. The chance of the interest rate rising by 25 basis points by the Bank of England rose to 48%. Were that to be implemented, it would lead to a 1.2% rise in the pound against the US dollar, impacting the sol to pounds exchange rate adversely. Conversely, anticipation that the Federal Reserve will lower interest rates in September (72% CME probability) may weaken the US dollar, which renders SOL an attractive GBP investment. Bloomberg statistics show that the 30-day correlation coefficient between SOL and GBP/USD exchange rate is -0.37, so a 1% fall in the pound is likely to raise SOL/GBP by 0.4%.
Regulatory risks and compliance costs drive liquidity. Binance UK’s suspension of SOL/GBP trading pair for three days (July 18-21) resulted from the FCA of the United Kingdom AML review when the market spread widened to 1.2% and daily trading volume on average dropped by 63%. Nevertheless, the compliant platform Coinpass offers for instant pounds exchange via Faster Payments with a 0.15% fee, and users increased by 29% this week. Data from on-chain indicate that the percentage of sol to pounds transactions by regulated institutions increased from 58% to 73%, and the compliance premium charged an additional 1.8%-2.5% above the price of the dark web market.
Short-term trends are verified by on-chain activities. Active Solana wallets rose to 1.4 million during the week (21% year-on-year growth), with 27% of addresses participating in sol to pounds trade, and the average daily use of Gas contributed 19%. Whale addresses holding over 100,000 SOL saw their growth decrease by 8% this month compared to last month (2.9 million in July and 2.67 million since August), with an average price of 116.2 GBP. If they are left at the current price, there is a potential floating profit of 2.1%. As far as staking goes, the SOL annual yield is 5.8% (around 6.87 GBP/SOL), more than the UK average 4.1% of savings accounts, getting 23,000 users to opt for staking instead of redemption.
in short, the current sol to pound exchange rate is the cumulative result of technical (EMA golden cross), environmental development (Cashio protocol), regulatory maneuvering (FCA review) and the macro pound direction. Short-term traders can target the pressure zone of 122-125 GBP. In case it breaks, they can increase their positions. Long-term investors will place SOL to earn compound interest and monitor Firedancer’s upgrade process (targeting 1 million TPS). Its successful rollout can bring SOL/GBP up to an all-time high of 150 GBP by the end of the year.