IMPORTANT POINTS:
- Solana emerges as one of the top-performing cryptocurrencies in the Layer-1 sector, surpassing Ethereum and Bitcoin.
- The Solana blockchain stands out for its speed and low cost, with a significant increase in its market capitalization and trading volume.
- Recent developments, such as Firedancer and partnerships with Visa and Shopify, reinforce Solana’s leading position in the cryptocurrency market.
Solana (SOL), has emerged as one of the top-performing cryptocurrencies among Layer-1 blockchains, with an impressive 80% increase in the last month. High-performing Layer-1 cryptocurrencies also include Avalanche (AVAX), up 82%, Cardano (ADA), up 28%, and Tron (TRX), up 8%.
Unlike Solana, Ethereum (ETH), another Layer-1 token, saw a 12% increase in the same period. Meanwhile, Bitcoin (BTC), which surpassed the $38,000 mark in the last week, recorded a 9% increase in the last month.
What is happening with Solana?
Ranked sixth in the top cryptocurrencies, Solana’s market capitalization has seen an expansion of 3.9%, while trading volume in the last 24 hours has seen an increase of 81%. According to data from DefiLlama, Solana’s total value locked (TVL) stood at $653.71 million, marking a change of 7.5% in the last 24 hours, compared to the $149 million reported in March 2021.
This Layer-1 blockchain boasts of a fast and low-cost platform, and combines the Proof-of-History (PoH) consensus mechanism with the more common Proof-of-Stake (PoS). Currently, Solana is capable of processing 3,111 transactions per second with a block time of 400 milliseconds.
Active addresses in the last 24 hours amount to 163,872 with 39.42 million transactions. In total, the blockchain reports 11.5 million active accounts.
In the last 30 days, SOL has seen a 70% increase, taking its year-to-date gains to 340%, while Avalanche, Cardano, and Tron report year-to-date gains of 68%, 25%, and 93%, respectively.
Why is Solana important?
In late October, Solana Foundation CEO Dan Albert announced the launch of the Firedancer testnet, which Web3 development firm Jump Crypto has been building since August 2022. This is a new validator that will boost Solana’s performance to a significant million transactions per second. It is scheduled to launch on the mainnet in the first half of 2024.
Solana was highlighted as the choice for Visa’s revolutionary cross-border payments project in September 2023 and Shopify introduced Solana Pay in August 2023 as a new payment option on the platform.
Additionally, ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood stated:
“Solana is doing a really good job. Ether was faster and cheaper than Bitcoin at the time; this is how we got Ether. Solana is even faster and cheaper than Ether.”
Digital asset investment sector saw significant inflows of $346 million, reaching the highest weekly inflows for the ninth consecutive week. Tickets at Solana amounted to $3.5 million.
Could Solana soon surpass the $70 mark? If that happens, it will be the first time SOL has returned to that price level since May 2022.
