+670% compared to prices a year ago

During the recovery of the crypto market in 2023, there was one coin in particular that seemed to reward the courage of investors after a year: we are of course talking about Solana (SOL).

Even though many other cryptocurrencies have shown excellent performance, Solana ranks first in one-year return with an astonishing +670%.

Consider that by investing $1,000 in SOL in August 2023, you could have left with $8,000 just 12 months later.

The merits of this success are multiple and range from strong DeFi adoption, to airdrop incentives and growth in the memecoin sector.

Let’s check all the details below.

Solana enriches crypto investors between 2023 and 2024

In the last year of trading in the crypto market, Solana has emerged as the best chart-performing asset, bringing impressive gains to investors.

After the 2022 bear market that sent SOL prices down amid the FTX crisis, the coin recovered within a few months

Especially from the bottom of 8 dollars, which was reached in the last week of 2022, the crypto closed 2023 at 101 dollars with an increase of more than 1150%.

In 2024, the Solana coin then continued to print green candles until March, further doubling the price above $200.

From March to today, it appears to be down about 37% instead, in a generally bearish scenario for the entire cryptographic market.

As reported by Altcoin Index, if we take the prices of a year ago (August 26, 2023) as a reference, Solana is currently up 670%.

Consider that by investing 1,000 dollars in SOL a year ago, you could have had a token equivalent value of around 8,000 dollars today. Indeed, during its “over-the-year” performance, the value of the crypto-asset rose from 20 to 160 dollars.

This is a major milestone for the blockchain project, which has seen a significant increase in investor interest in the crypto ecosystem.

The factors that have driven the rise in Solana’s prices over the past year are numerous. Among the most important we find the appreciation of retail for low-fee DeFi products and the increase in popularity of some decentralized exchanges like Jupiter.

It is worth noting how various airdrop incentives have forced many investors to step into the Solana market to gain an economic advantage.

Finally, the development of the memecoin sector, under the influence of platforms like Pump.fun, played a key role in the appreciation of the entire cryptographic project.

Graphics performance over one year: the comparison with the rest of the market

The performance of the crypto Solana in the eyes of investors seems even more significant compared to the trend of the rest of the digital token market.

As reported by Altcoin Index, SOL appears to be the best cryptographic asset for price growth over the past year.

Its returns surpass those of top seeds Bitcoin and Ethereum, which report gains of 143% and 65%, respectively, in the same period.

Within the high-cap altcoin sector, no coin has managed to match the graphical achievements of Solana.

Dogecoin, Cardano and Uniswap, with investor returns of 74%, 44% and 38%, are very far from the results of the competitor.

Tron, Avalanche, Chainlink and Internet Computer, although they have achieved gains of more than 100%, do not match the performance of Solana.

Not even Toncoin and Kaspa, which saw spectacular increases of 209% and 371% over a year, can compare to the currency known as the “Ethereum Killer”.

Amid positive numbers, there are also signs that reported below-expected performance. For example, Bitcoin Cash, Polygon and Litecoin are the only ones with negative investment returns of 0.1%, 5.5% and 1.5% in a year.

Instead, the price of Near Protocol has remained virtually the same from August last year to today.

Right now, Solana is about 50% away from its own all-time high set at $260. Some speculate a continuation of the bull market from here until the end of 2025, although the crypto may end the party early, as it was one of the first to recover ground in 2023.

In the meantime, we remain waiting to discover what the fate of SOL will be in the last quarter of the year, where potentially positive feedback for the entire crypto-ecosystem is expected.

Solana: future horizons between crypto ETFs and blockchain developments

One of the issues that attracts the most interest in the discussions of Solana crypto investors is the possible approval of a spot ETF on US exchanges.

After the debut of the ETF for Bitcoin and Ethereum, the market began to press for a subsequent listing of the same products on the SOL coin.

However, recently the SEC postponed the long-awaited appointment and said that the crypto can be labeled as a security. The Chicago Stock Exchange (CBOE) withdrew the 19b-4 form a few days ago in anticipation of the next potential approval event.

Now all eyes are on November 5th, when the SEC will be called upon to rule again on the Solana ETF issue.

Some users, such as investor “Evan_ss6” highlight how the recent SEC rejection coincides with the top of SOL in the chart against ETH.

It is therefore not excluded that the currency may in future fare below the rest of the market, after it has taken the leading role in the past two years.

In determining the future of Solana, there are also other issues related to the infrastructure development of the blockchain on the horizon.

Indeed, the project attracts many investors precisely because of some features of the chain, such as the high scalability and the cost efficiency of transactions.

Compared to Ethereum, Solana seems much smarter, able to support a high TP/s at the cost of less decentralization.

The goal of the project is to further improve its ability to support on-chain requests, to reach the level of international payment circuits such as Visa and Mastercard.

We will see if the blockchain of Solana will be able to maintain the preeminence of the most scalable network in the future, and grow at a faster rate than other competitors.