Solana (SOL) is on a strong rally early on Tuesday, rising by almost 30% in the past 24 hours, enjoying the upbeat mood among investors towards DeFi and NFTs as projects running on its ecosystem garner high levels of attention and usage. At the time of writing, SOL/USDT is trading just above $182.

So far this year, Solana’s value has skyrocketed by almost 8,000%, making it one of the best performing cryptocurrencies in 2021. Making the most of the bull run in the wider crypto market as well as attracting more DeFi and NFT projects to its network, there are several promising fundamentals supporting its surge and giving analysts reason to believe that the rally towards new ATHs could continue for some more time.

Solana has been making a big mark in the DeFi space over the past few weeks, with the total value locked in DeFi protocols running on its network soaring from around $1.2 billion in the beginning of August to more than $5.7 billion till date. The biggest project in the space, Saber (SBR) has more than doubled its value over the past week alone, and more projects are flocking to the network that supports one of the fastest transaction speeds and low costs.

Solana’s rise could also be supported by news of a new DeFi project running on its blockchain, Cyclos, raising $2.1 million round in funding recently. The project aims to use these funds to create the network’s first concentrated liquidity AMM, an idea first pioneered by Uniswap V3.

Key Levels to Watch

On the H4 price chart of SOL/USDT, moving averages and the MACD are suggesting a strong bullish bias. Although, the momentum and RSI indicators suggest some selling interest among investors as well.

Solana’s price has broken past the pivot point at $128.73 and made its way above the first resistance level at $163.87. It now looks like buyers are gearing up to test the next resistance at $185.75 soon, a break above which opens the door to the key $200 mark soon.