Solana overtakes XRP to become 5th in market capitalization – boosted by meme coin boom | CoinDesk JAPAN

According to CoinMarketCap data, Solana (SOL)’s market capitalization reached a 20-month high of $33.7 billion (4,886.5 billion yen, exchange rate of 150 yen to the dollar), surpassing XRP (XRP). It became the 5th largest crypto asset (virtual currency).

Solana is fending off selling pressure from holdings of the bankruptcy estate of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, with recent price increases driven by decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem tied to over-fueled meme coin craze is rapidly growing.

This week, rising Solana prices and consistent inflows into DeFi protocols led to an increase in Total Value Locked (TVL) on the Solana blockchain to $1 billion for the first time since the FTX collapse last November. yen).

The trading volume of decentralized exchanges (DEX) on the Solana blockchain has increased. Orca achieved trading volume of $746 million on December 15th, but through November it had only exceeded $100 million once. Much of the increase in activity can be attributed to meme coins such as dog-themed BONK, which currently has a market capitalization of over $1.2 billion (approximately 174 billion yen).

Speculators are racing to find the next meme coin that can turn hundreds of dollars into hundreds of thousands of dollars. To purchase the meme coin of your choice, you typically first purchase Solana as a medium of exchange. After that, every time a meme coin is sold and returned to Solana, it effectively creates buying pressure on Solana.

However, much of the recent attention has been on the Solana blockchain itself. Following a series of suspensions last year, Solana blockchain appears to have improved the stability of its network. It has also distanced itself from FTX, which went bankrupt after purchasing $1 billion worth of Solana blockchain-based crypto assets before filing for bankruptcy.

Solana is currently trading at $81.04, an increase of 9.14% in the past 24 hours. According to CoinMarketCap, trading volume increased 39% to $2.6 billion (approximately 377 billion yen).

｜Translation and editing: Rinan Hayashi
｜Image: CoinDesk
｜Original text: Solana Leapfrogs XRP as Fifth-Largest Crypto, Spurred by Meme Coin Mania