(Bloomberg) — The sudden plunge in Bitcoin dragged the cryptocurrency world into a sea of red, but there was a key holdout: Solana’s SOL token.
SOL averted a big drawdown over the past 24 hours, underlining investor interest in the argument that its linked blockchain Solana is a potential long-term rival for Ethereum, currently the most-used network for applications like decentralized finance and digital collectibles.
Proponents tout the claimed speed and lower cost of transactions on Solana as well as its potential to support high-frequency trading strategies. Decentralized-finance projects using Solana technology recently surpassed $3 billion, highlighting the network’s ability to compete with Ethereum, according to Steve Ehrlich, co-founder of crypto trading app Voyager Digital.
The drop in the broader crypto universe came amid El Salvador’s troubled rollout of Bitcoin as legal tender due to glitches in the nation’s official digital wallet, which appear to have been resolved.
The largest cryptocurrecncy is down some 10% in the past 24 hours, whereas SOL has slipped about 2%. The overall market value of digital coins fell about $300 billion over the period, according to tracker CoinGecko. SOL has more than quadrupled in the past 30 days.
More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com
©2021 Bloomberg L.P.
