Validators on Solana received 100K SOL after TRUMP token launch

Solana’s validators received record fees and bribes to achieve swaps for Official Trump (TRUMP) and MELANIA. The fee record surpassed previous periods of peak trading activity. 

Peak trading activity for Official Trump (TRUMP) increased bribes and fees to validators above 100K SOL over two days of active trading. Validators marked a peak both in terms of SOL inflows and a record number of bundles and posting wallets. Peak trading happened on January 20, when validators received more than 87K SOL. 

The exceptional activity was mostly tied to the TRUMP token rally. The asset took a step back, sliding to $40.12, after peaking above $70. 

A total of 24.7M bundles were sent out to guarantee transaction success. While base SOL sending fees remained low, interacting with some apps incurred much higher expenses. 

A total of 1.5M unique tippers paid out the fees, out of a total 4.5M Solana daily active users. Peak tippers underscored the interest in TRUMP and related tokens, for sniping and early swaps on Meteora and Orca. 

Validators worked overtime to post transactions to the main chain, especially during temporary outages of some Solana services. Helius Labs, Solayer, and JitoSOL, managed to ensure access for experienced traders. However, not all transactions went through, leading to competitive posting and record-high fees. Jito received SOL both as a validator and as a MEV service, rising to about 10% of total fees. 

Solana itself has not posted a status for being offline or having problem with its consensus. During the early hours of TRUMP and MELANIA launches, transactions were still highly competitive, using bots and sniping techniques. Users that tried to go through Coinbase saw their SOL transactions pending for hours. 

Solana grows its real economic value

The fees and tips on Solana are the chain’s real economic value, showing the real demand of users. Meme token demand, whether for Pump.fun tokens or other launches, reveals the preferences of real users and the chain’s leading application. On Solana, block building does not include sandwich attacks or other forms of sniping, meaning all tip payers are traders interested in the potential of the latest tokens. MEV activity is seen as positive for Solana and one of the big incentives to validators.

The real economic value showed base fees were a negligible source of income, and no voting transactions were handled in the past few days. However, the bulk of activity came from Jito tips and priority fees. 

Solana’s period of exceptional economic activity also affected stakers and holders, where annualized passive income can rise to 7.14%, while inflation is under 5%. The latest meme trading peak also caused record SOL burns, balancing the slightly higher new issuance and fees. Solana also showed it could handle much higher traffic compared to Ethereum, though still reaching the limit of its services. 

In the past 24 hours, Solana still produced more than 35M in fees. Meteora also shot forward as the new venue for meme tokens, gaining more than $59M in fees. The entire Solana ecosystem took part in the latest drive to snipe the latest tokens. 

The MEVX and Trojan bots were among the biggest fee producers, as bot activity reached peak levels. Phantom wallet lined up among the top 10 fee producers, despite a brief overload period.

SOL open interest slides after the initial frenzy

The peak SOL activity did not result in an immediate rally for SOL. Open interest for SOL slid from over $5.1B down to $3.5B. 

SOL retreated to $233, after peaking above $270. For now, SOL has slowed down and has not fulfilled the expectations of rising to $300. 

Even days after the launch of TRUMP, Coinbase users complained of delayed SOL transactions. 

SOL expects to move to a higher price range, as its activity habitually surpasses that of Ethereum. The ease of launching tokens and the growing liquidity might mean Solana is displacing Ethereum as the hub for token activity.

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