Research · Altcoins · Strand D

SOL during Bitcoin bull and bear phases

Bitcoin's cycle gives the calendar. This page asks what Solana did while each phase was running, and it answers that question as an association rather than as a claim about cause.

Last reviewed 2026-09-21Source: CoinGecko daily close series for SOL and BTC; Bitcoin Data Guide cycle definitionsPhase definitions follow this site's Bitcoin cycle pages. The SOL descriptions are associations within those phases, not causal claims.

The phase frame

The phases used here are Bitcoin's, taken from this site's own cycle record so the frame is consistent with the rest of the site. A bull phase is the expansion from a cycle low to the high that follows it; a bear phase is the contraction from that high to the next low. The dates are the ones used on the cycle comparison page.

SOL's behaviour inside each phase is described from the CoinGecko daily close series, which begins in August 2020. That means the comparison covers the 2021 expansion, the 2022 contraction, and the recovery phase that followed. Bitcoin's earlier cycles are outside the window because SOL did not trade during them.

The method is deliberately descriptive. For each phase the page states whether SOL rose or fell, whether it moved with or against Bitcoin, and whether the phase contained asset-specific events that moved SOL independently. It does not compute a beta, and it does not attribute SOL's moves to Bitcoin's.

SOL inside each Bitcoin phase

Bitcoin's cycle phases and how SOL behaved inside each one, described as an association rather than a causal relationship.
Bitcoin phase	Window	SOL behaviour in the phase
Expansion	2020 low – Nov 2021 high	Rose with the market and outpaced Bitcoin over the phase. The advance was larger than Bitcoin's, and the phase contained several SOL-specific episodes that moved the price independently of the wider market.
Contraction	Nov 2021 high – 2022 low	Fell with the market and fell further than Bitcoin over the same window. The decline included asset-specific events in late 2022 that extended the fall beyond what the market factor alone would imply.
Recovery	2023 low – 2024 high	Rose with the market but did not regain its previous peak against Bitcoin. The phase was comparatively free of asset-specific shocks, so the common market factor accounts for more of the daily variation.
Recent phase	2024 high – review date	Traded with the market, with short decouplings around network events. Relative performance against Bitcoin has been mixed rather than one-directional.

Last reviewed 2026-09-21Source: CoinGecko daily close series for SOL and BTCPhase boundaries are Bitcoin's, taken from this site's cycle pages. The SOL column describes observed behaviour within those windows.

Association, timing and common factors

The pattern in the table is an association. SOL rose during Bitcoin's expansion and fell during Bitcoin's contraction, and the timing lines up because both assets were responding to the same market conditions. That is a statement about co-movement within a shared window, and it is the strongest claim the data supports.

The common factor is the obvious candidate explanation. Both assets trade as high-beta instruments against the same liquidity conditions, and when those conditions change, both reprice. A reader who wants to know why SOL fell in 2022 does not need a Bitcoin-specific explanation: the whole risk-asset complex fell, and SOL fell harder because it is smaller and thinner.

Timing is a separate question from association and is often confused with it. That SOL's decline began near Bitcoin's decline does not establish that Bitcoin's decline caused SOL's. Two series can turn at the same time because a third factor turned, and in this record that is the more parsimonious reading. The correlation page covers the measurement question in more detail.

Where SOL diverged from the phase

The most informative parts of the record are the stretches where SOL did not follow the phase. In the 2021 expansion there were periods when SOL moved sharply on network-specific news while Bitcoin was range-bound, and in late 2022 there were periods when SOL fell on counterparty-specific events that did not have a matching effect on Bitcoin's price.

Those divergences are worth naming because they show the limits of the phase frame. A phase defined by Bitcoin is a useful calendar, but it is not a complete description of what any other asset did inside it. Where an asset-specific factor was large, SOL's behaviour is better explained by that factor than by the phase.

The reverse case also appears: stretches where SOL's moves were almost entirely explained by the market factor, with little asset-specific variation. Those are the periods in which the phase frame works best, and they are the periods in which the correlation coefficient is highest.

What this page does not claim

This page does not claim that Bitcoin's phases caused Solana's behaviour. The phases are a calendar, and the descriptions are associations observed inside that calendar. A reader who wants a causal account would need evidence that is not in a price series.

The page also makes no claim about what SOL will do in a future phase. The relationship between the two assets has changed over the window, and there is no basis in this record for assuming it will hold in the next one.

Dataset, period, method and limitations

Dataset: CoinGecko daily close series for SOL and BTC, with phase boundaries taken from this site's Bitcoin cycle record and network events dated from Solana's official status page.
Period: August 2020 to the last complete month before the review date, covering the 2021 expansion, the 2022 contraction and the recovery that followed.
Method: Bitcoin's own expansion and contraction phases are used as the frame. For each phase the page states whether SOL rose or fell, whether it moved with or against Bitcoin, and whether the phase contained asset-specific events. No beta is computed and no causal attribution is made.
Limitations: The phase definitions are editorial; a different rule would draw the boundaries elsewhere. The record covers one full cycle for SOL, so a single observation of behaviour in each phase is not a pattern. The page makes no claim about future phases.

Where this sits in the wider record

This page supplies the phase frame that the drawdown comparison and the outperformance periods page both use. The market-cap growth page covers what supply changes did to the capitalisation series across the same phases.

For Bitcoin's own phase record, see market cycles and return profiles.

Sources and references

Every source below is named and linked. Where a page describes a method rather than a figure, the source is the specification or documentation that defines the method. Last reviewed 2026-09-21.

Solana historical data. CoinGecko, www.coingecko.com/en/coins/solana: the series behind the SOL column.
Bitcoin historical data. CoinGecko, www.coingecko.com/en/coins/bitcoin: the series behind the phase boundaries.
Bitcoin cycle comparison. Bitcoin Data Guide, bitcoindataguide.com/cycle-comparison: the expansion and contraction dates used as the frame.
Solana status. Solana, status.solana.com/: used to date the asset-specific episodes referenced in the divergence section.
Market-structure research. Glassnode, insights.glassnode.com/: used to cross-check the characterisation of the 2022 contraction.