$ARC sitting at $70M valuation? Track back to $PIPPIN—same playbook, different token.

Here's what's really happening on Solana: systematic price manipulation. We're not talking accidents or natural market volatility. This is deliberate.

The mechanics are straightforward. Market makers—typically consolidated into a single dominant party on the chain—engineer artificial price movements. Up one day to attract retail FOMO, down the next to shake out weak hands. The real goal? Accumulating tokens at suppressed prices while casual traders get liquidated.

Look at the timeline. Major dumps always follow coordinated buys. Liquidity suddenly dries up when prices spike. These aren't coincidences—they're patterns. The same group benefits from both directions of movement because they control the order flow.

What makes it particularly visible on Solana? Speed and transparency. You can actually track wallet transactions in real-time. Unlike centralized exchanges where market maker activity stays opaque, on-chain data shows everything if you know where to look.

The real question isn't whether manipulation exists. It's why these patterns keep repeating across projects with similar market cap profiles.