Solana (SOL -4.87%) is currently priced near $146 per coin, but if the stars align, it’s easy to see how it could grow to be worth more than $500.
There’s no need to rely on fanciful hopes of a speculative boom or a fresh round of excitement in its meme coin casino. Instead, there’s one metric in particular that tends to get lost in discussion about the coin’s chances of increasing in value, but which is highly relevant to the coin’s growth over time.
Let’s take a beat to understand what that metric is, and then think about how it’s an important driver of Solana’s success in the future.
Most investors don’t pay attention where it matters
Blockchains like Solana aim to be hubs for decentralized finance (DeFi) activity, which includes decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges, lending or borrowing platforms, and distributed payment processors, among other types of projects in that segment. The whole point of many cryptocurrencies is to offer these decentralized services so as to provide a backbone for an alternative financial system that’s distinct from the one that most people interact with using fiat currency. But much like in the traditional financial sector, DeFi products and services aren’t free; most generate revenue in some form or another, and a few even turn a profit.
Therefore, one very important yet perpetually overlooked metric to judge the merits of a chain’s main coin as an investment is how healthy its DeFi ecosystem is in terms of providing services that are financially successful in terms of generating revenue. On that front, Solana is performing swimmingly, and this fact will likely be a big driver of higher prices for the coin moving forward once the market notices.
As of mid-afternoon on March 24, the DeFi apps on Solana generated a cumulative total of over $2.5 billion in revenue since the chain’s launch, $4.7 million of which was generated over the prior 24 hours. For the sake of comparison, consider that on the same day in 2022, its DeFi apps had brought in a cumulative haul of just $253,650 since the chain’s inception. There’s a very clear trend of the chain’s projects gaining traction and experiencing significant revenue growth over time here.
According to CoinGecko, a cryptocurrency data source, Solana’s DeFi segment is worth a total market cap of $6.6 billion, making it a significant contributor to the coin’s market cap of $74.4 billion. This means that DeFi is a center for value generation on the chain, even though it’s the chain’s meme coins that seem to steal the spotlight again and again.
Don’t fixate on a price, focus on the value generation that’s happening
But does the budding DeFi ecosystem on Solana mean that the coin is guaranteed to go to $500 soon? No, not at all. Much like with companies that issue stock, the market might not care at all about rising on-chain revenue. Even if investors do notice, it could take a long time before that leads to the coin’s price actually rising.
Nonetheless, this is an unambiguously positive picture for Solana’s chance of success as an investment moving forward. Consistently making revenue is only possible if there are products or services that people are willing to pay for, and the evidence shows that there are at least a handful of those things happening here. Evidence of this process is likely to attract developer talent as well as new investors to the chain, both of which will support its health.
One risk here is that data on whether the tokens generating revenue are also making a profit is unavailable. It is thus not easy to assess whether the DeFi projects in Solana’s ecosystem can continue to grow over the long term or if they will peter out due to a lack of funds. The odds are good that if profits become common and consistent, projects on the chain will find a way to communicate that they’re making more money than they’re spending to bring in revenue so as to get investors to buy their token. That would also generate some additional demand for the underlying Solana coin, if it happens.
Overall, the rising DeFi app revenue might not be enough to power Solana over the $500 mark on its own, at least not immediately — but it’s still a bullish sign. If you were considering an investment in the coin before, consider that so long as the trend of revenue growth over time continues to hold, the balance of risk and reward of buying and holding this coin should continue to be favorable over the long run.
