Solana has come such a long way over the last 2 years. Many prominent crypto Twitter influencers told people to hoover up as much of it as possible between Q4 2022 and Q4 2023. In January last year, you could pick up 1 SOL for less than $10 – which would’ve been an incredible return.
Since then, altcoin has grown by over 2,000% and reached the $250 price range. But these predictions have grown even more dramatically given the way Solana has now positioned itself in the market—with some in the crypto industry, including prominent analysts, believing that it could have the legs to reach anywhere between $800 and $1000 at the peak of this current bull run. Is this something people are saying to pump their bags, or is there a serious possibility that Solana could reach 4-figures and become the biggest winner of this cycle?
Expansive Use Cases – Casino Gaming
A few major variables need to be in an altcoin’s favor to see significant returns. Several ongoing positive factors are propelling Solana’s price toward new all-time highs.
As retail users flock back into cryptocurrency, many do not understand the intricacies of the blockchain or the value of different cryptocurrencies. They need a tangible, clear use case. One that has emerged, and one that Solana has found itself at the center of – is a flurry of online gamers fuelling the modern-day casino gaming boom.
As these markets continue to expand in Europe and throughout North America, casino gaming has become the unlikely vehicle to showcase the marvel of cryptocurrency to a mainstream retail audience. Although some cryptocurrency casinos have been around for nearly a decade, the recent demand for crypto has seen the number of online casino platforms wanting to provide a facility for online casino gamers accelerate dramatically.
General Gaming
It’s not just casino gaming that has been causing a Solana rush; there’s been a boom in the number of Solana NFT gaming providers that have emerged since the early part of this century. Epic Games has a phenomenal choice of games, with their top 10 Solana NFT games amongst some of the most prominent use cases that continue to drive insatiable demand in the asset.
Pump.Fun Memes
Although this element of Solana’s growth has plateaued, given that there are controversies surrounding Pump.fun and their live streams, between September and November 2024, the rise of memecoins has been the number one route that has brought mass retail.
At the peak of its usage in November 2024, dozens of coins were launching on Pump.fun every second. While most of these coins resulted in investors losing significant sums, as 99% of them do, the success of viral meme coins, such as the Chill Guy token, has resulted in some of the biggest cryptocurrency platforms listing the memecoin.
Given that Chill Guy is just one of many memecoins launched on the Solana network that now have market caps in the hundreds of millions of dollars, then the subsequent asset is obviously going to benefit from the surge in visibility and activity and the sheer number of retail investors looking for exposure to the token and the network.
Dissecting The Competition
Until recently, Ethereum has lagged behind the absolute powerhouse of Bitcoin, which nearly soared from $69,000 to $100,000 in the space of a month. Some optimistic Solana maxis have even suggested that it could be on its way to claiming Ethereum’s position as the chief of the altcoins. This isn’t happening, but I suppose there’s no harm in being positive. Aside from Ethereum, Solana has steamrolled the competition, sailing past the market cap of BNB and XRP like they weren’t even there.
Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of Ripple and the chief holder of XRP, claimed that an ETF involving the highly centralized asset was imminent, which has seen the price surge by over 200% in less than a month, helping it flip the market caps of Dogecoin and Cardano. But it’s still $30 million behind Solana and would have to have another massive spike in price to try and get ahead of SOL.
Conclusion
Solana has become the face of retail altcoins, and this will be a blessing for those who scooped it up at $10 per token last year. However, it will also be a concern, as the arrival of retail is a notorious top signal. Memecoins, ridiculous ideas, and pointless tokens might be fun in the short term, but they can retract quickly, and Solana could see itself bearing the brunt of this at some point.
There are also several large token unlocks to look out for in Q1 2025 – but if it can continue its momentum, and the bull run can last between now and Q2 2025, Solana will not come out as the most significant overall winner. If it can reach $800 per token, this would mean an 8,000% increase in the price in less than 2 years.
