A sigh of relief at Solana: Token payout postponed

The collapse of the crypto exchange FTX leaves a shambles on the crypto market. Of all the cryptocurrencies that lost feathers in the wake of the stock market crash, Solana was particularly hard hit. In the course of the week, the SOL price fell from over 30 to 12 US dollars in the meantime. However, with a daily gain of 25 percent, Solana is gradually ironing out the price dip after the distribution of millions of SOL tokens was postponed.

Solana postpones staking payout

Two developments have created a mood of crisis in the Solana community. As revealed in the FTX revelations, Alameda Research holds significant amounts of SOL tokens. The looming bankruptcy of the hedge fund belonging to FTX triggered panic selling among investors – the Solana price fell.

Added to this was unfortunate timing: amidst the unfolding events surrounding FTX, tens of millions of SOL tokens were to be unlocked from the staking pot. The distribution of the tokens worth half a billion US dollars could have further diluted the price significantly.

Like the Solana Foundation announcedthe deadline has now been pushed back: “While 28.5M SOL was supposed to be unlocked in this epoch (370), the plan has now been pushed back and all 28.5M SOL have now been staked again”.

Validators banned from the server

The staking payout is related to server operator Hetzner, which blocked all network activity by Solana validators last week. The German cloud service provider, through which a large part of the Solana network ran, has disconnected over 1,000 validators from the server. The affected nodes are now online again.

“On 2.11. Hetzner removed many of Solana’s independent validators in connection with a change in its policy,” according to the Solana Foundation. “As a result, the Solana Foundation began taking back 28.5 million SOL that had been transferred to these validators under the Solana Foundation’s delegation program.” When the tokens will be unlocked has not yet been announced.