Top projects building on Solana in 2022

summary: Our thesis is that holding the Solana token (SOL) for the long term is like investing in the Solana ecosystem. To find out if the ecosystem is healthy, we identified the top projects built on Solana that you can compare to other L1 chains like Ethereum.

Founded in 2017, Solana is a Layer 1 blockchain platform (read: Ethereum rival) that hosts decentralized and scalable applications. Over 350 projects are currently being built on the Solana blockchain, with around 1,000 active developers.

Solana offers lower transaction fees than other popular blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum. In theory, the blockchain can process over 50,000 transactions per second and claims to be the “fastest blockchain in the world.”

As long-term crypto investors, that’s how we see it The quality of a blockchain is defined by the quality of the apps based on it. Technology isn’t as important as the ecosystem of developers, users, and killer apps.

For investors thinking of buying and holding Solana’s native token SOL for the long term, we’ve listed the top Solana projects so you can see the quality for yourself.

	market capitalization	24 hour trading volume	Locked Total Value (TVL)	Daily active users
Marinade Finance (MNDE)	$6.7M	$20.5k	$248.4M	N / A
Serum (SRM)	$283.9M	$28.2M	$225.7M	10.207
Solend (SLND)	$13.7M	$110,000	$246.3M	N / A
Raydium (RAY)	$103.5M	$9.4M	$235 million	1,050
Tulip Protocol (TULIP)	$2.6M	$91.5k	$157.8M	N / A
Mango Markets (MNGO)	$44.3M	$163,700	$128.2M	584
Killer Whale (ORCA)	$16.7M	$318,700	$100.9	1,461
Saber Exchange (SBR)	$3.2M	$116,400	$87.6M	1,369
Aldrin (RIN)	$1.5 million	$14.7 000	$73.9M	642

Marinade Finance (MNDE)

market capitalization: $6.7M

24 hour trade value: $20.5,000

Locked Total Value (TVL): $248.4M

Daily active users: N / A

Marinade Finance is a no-custodial liquid staking protocol running on the Solana blockchain. The platform allows users to stake their SOL tokens through predetermined staking strategies. In return for staking, participants receive “Marinated Staking SOL Tokens” (mSOL). These tokens can be used to maximize yield using Marinade’s decentralized finance (DeFi) features. They can also be used in the broader Solana ecosystem.

Alternatively, participants can exchange their wagered SOL for a regular SOL at any time once they have canceled the wager. Marinade Finance also offers no lock-up periods and participants can access their assets at any time. The platform also offers an extensive network of validators to ensure decentralization and security.

Serum (SRM)

market capitalization: $283.9M

24 hour trade value: $28.2M

Locked Total Value (TVL): $225.7M

Daily active users: 10,207

Serum is a decentralized exchange (DEX) built on top of Solana. With Solana, Serum can benefit from the cost-efficiency and speed of transactions processed on its blockchain.

Serum comes with a decentralized order book maintained by smart contracts that aim to mimic traditional exchanges through matching sellers and buyers. This gives participants flexibility on order sizes and prices when submitting orders to Serum, giving them complete control over their trading.

Serum aims to compete with DEXes created using an automated market maker such as SushiSwap, Uniswap or Bancor.

Serum also offers cross-chain support, meaning users can trade tokens created on other platforms like Ethereum or Polkadot. Existing DeFi projects can also access Serum’s liquidity and features, regardless of which blockchain they are built on.

Serum’s utility token, SRM, allows holders to get up to a 50% discount on their trading fees, and stakers can vote and participate in the platform’s governance mechanism.

Solend (SLND)

market capitalization: $13.7M

24 hour trade value: $110,000

Locked Total Value (TVL): $246.3M

Daily active users: N / A

Solend is a rental and lending platform on the Solana network. It describes itself as an “autonomous interest machine”. With low fees and fast transactions, participants can earn interest and borrow up to 16 assets across 40+ pools.

Solend offers an easy-to-use and user-friendly dashboard. When depositing assets on Solend, participants receive a share of the interest automatically calculated by the algorithm.

Solend plans to gradually transform its governance into a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) that will allow the community to participate in project governance.

Raydium (RAY)

market capitalization: $103.5M

24 hour trade value: $9.4M

Locked Total Value (TVL): 235 million dollars

Daily active users: 1,050

Raydium is an automated market maker (AMM) built on the Solana blockchain that shares liquidity with Serum’s decentralized exchange. As an AMM, it enables permissionless trading of cryptocurrencies and other digital assets via liquidity pools.

By combining the flexibility of an AMM with the reliability of Serum, Raydium supports fast, liquid and low-fee digital asset trading on Solana with an additional source of liquidity.

Users who offer liquidity to Raydium receive incentives in the form of RAY, the Raydium ecosystem utility token. In return, participants can wager RAY to earn additional crypto rewards.

Tulip Protocol (TULIP)

market capitalization: $2.6M

24 hour trade value: $91.5,000

Locked Total Value (TVL): $157.8M

Daily active users: N / A

The Tulip protocol was the first yield aggregation platform built on top of the Solana blockchain. It offers three main income products: Lending, Vault and Leveraged Farming. Thanks to Solana’s cost-effective and powerful network, its vault strategies complement each other consistently. Because of this, it can provide significant benefits to its users such as: B. A larger APY and low gas fees.

The name “tulip” is a reference to Holland’s notorious tulip craze. This market bubble burst in the 16th century when speculation about tulip bulbs drove prices to astonishing heights. Invest in Tulips or in TULIP at your own risk.

Mango Markets (MNGO)

market capitalization: $44.3M

24 hour trade value: $163,700

Locked Total Value (TVL): $128.2M

Daily active users: 584

Mango Markets is a decentralized exchange on the Solana blockchain that offers traders up to 20x leverage on trading pairs. Transactions are cheap, fast, and permissionless, and Mango Markets offers a variety of features that make it unique.

Like other decentralized exchanges on Solana, Mango Markets offers an on-chain order book (in the same style as a centralized exchange) without suffering from order latency and the high costs that plagued previous decentralized exchanges before the introduction of the automated market-maker model . The on-chain DEX model is possible due to Solana’s extremely cheap and fast transactions.

Mango Markets offers a small but well-curated selection of spot trading pairs. This includes assets in the Solana ecosystem such as COPE, RAY, SOL, SRM, and MNGO, as well as wrapped versions of BNB, BTC, ETH, FTT, and LUNA. You can also trade futures on most of these pairs, including ADA.

orca

market capitalization: $16.7M

24 hour trade value: $318,700

Locked Total Value (TVL): $100.9

Daily active users: 1,461

Orca is a decentralized exchange on Solana. Orca targets low-fee, near-instantaneous token swaps through an automated market maker (AMM) model. On the DEX, participants deliver tokens to liquidity pools and algorithms set market prices based on supply and demand. In addition, participants can use ORCA tokens to vote on the future of the protocol.

Orca also plans to offer a yield farming program known as Aqua Farm. A series of liquidity pools will soon become Aqua Farms. Currently, liquidity providers can earn trading fees in Orca pools. In contrast, Aqua Farms liquidity providers can earn both ORCA tokens and trading fees. Orca also plans to add a feature that will allow other projects to add their tokens as rewards in the future.

Saber (SBR)

market capitalization: $3.2M

24 hour trade value: $116,400

Locked Total Value (TVL): $87.6M

Daily active users: 1,369

Saber is a decentralized exchange on Solana focused on stablecoin trading and staking. There are currently exchange options for around 30 cryptocurrencies.

Users can also deploy their funds in liquidity pools. The Saber exchange currently offers around 25 liquidity pools, each representing a swap pair, such as USDT-USDC. Liquidity providers can earn a return based on every swap transaction on the platform the pair is a part of. Saber offers fast transaction times, low transaction fees, and low slippage rates.

Aldrin (RIN)

market capitalization: $1.5M

24 hour trade value: $14.7 000

Locked Total Value (TVL): $73.9M

Daily active users: 642

Aldrin is a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange built on the Solana network that aims to simplify the crypto trading process for novice and advanced traders alike.

Participants can already trade over 160 token pairs on the exchange. Aldrin offers a comprehensive and informative trading dashboard with the option for participants to review important token data before executing a trade. Aldrin makes it easy for traders to find a token’s website, its trading analytics, and other important data.

Investor Takeaway

As you can see, many exciting projects are being built on the Solana blockchain. It is no surprise that the leading projects are all related to DeFi because “that’s where the money is.”

The question is whether Solana can continue to build its developer community, because developers create apps and apps create users. While Solana is net adding new developers (below left), it still has a long way to go to catch up with Ethereum (above right).

Source: electrical capital

Many assume that the best technology will prevail, but history shows that this is not the case. The fastest blockchain is only useful if a large selection of killer apps is built on top of it. Solana is growing fast — but at this rate, not fast enough to overtake Ethereum.

Our thesis is that technology platforms will consolidate into two big winners (iPhone vs. Android, Mac vs. PC) or one big monopoly (Google). So we believe the L1 market will eventually mature.

So an investment in SOL is either a bet on a multi-chain future (and one where Solana is one of the surviving L1 chains) OR a bet that Solana will overtake Ethereum as one of the last chains. While Solana has some impressive technology, we wouldn’t bet on it.

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