Coinbase upgrades Solana infrastructure after user complaints

Coinbase has upgraded its infrastructure after receiving user complaints to support the Solana ecosystem better.

The largest U.S. crypto exchange has rolled out improved failsafes, enhanced liquidity measures, and faster transaction processing.

Additionally, Coinbase promised to speed up Solana transaction processing times in January after users encountered problems with depositing and withdrawing SOL.

Coinbase supercharges Solana support with 5x faster throughput

According to Coinbase, enhancements allowed quicker and more dependable sends and receives, reaffirming its dedication to providing industry-best results and dependability for its users. In addition, the crypto exchange highlighted that to satisfy demand, as Solana expanded in the future, it kept investing in its infrastructure.

The crypto exchange also shared an X post that detailed the enhancements. Based on the X post, these enhancements included asynchronous transaction processing that will result in a five-fold increase in block processing throughput, four-fold improvements to the remote procedure call (RPC), failover augmentations to increase resilience, liquidity optimizations, and enhanced operational controls.

Moreover, on January 21, Coinbase shared a post on the X platform stating that “Coinbase has seen unprecedented Solana transaction activity … and our systems have been unable to validate and process transactions at the speed that we are receiving them.”

This came after users experienced delays when attempting to withdraw or deposit SOL, sometimes lasting hours.

Interestingly, according to the crypto exchange, the volume of transactions at that time was ten times higher than usual. 

Meme coin trading has gained popularity, which has led to Solana’s widespread adoption

Extensive meme coin trading had been a major factor in Solana’s high transaction volumes. This resulted partly from a significant rise in Solana’s market capitalization that occurred the weekend before the inauguration when the new president and first lady released meme coins on the blockchain, contributing to the rise in popularity of meme coin trading.

However, weeks before Trump’s token launch, reports from sources revealed that Solana’s overall onchain trading volume and fees had reached all-time highs due to memecoin trading volume. On January 5, Solana’s onchain volume reached an all-time high of $3.79 billion, with approximately 4.5 million active addresses.

Solana is up nearly 23% over the past week, making it one of the biggest gainers in the top 100 coins. According to CoinMarketCap reports, Solana is trading at $133.32, reflecting a 0.04% increase in the past 24 hours. With a market capitalization of around $69.68 billion, it holds the sixth spot among all cryptocurrencies by market value.

The recent surge comes amid Wednesday’s launch of Canada’s first spot Solana ETFs from issuers, including 3iQ, Evolve, CI, and Purpose. The exchange-traded funds feature staking functionality, providing investors with yield obtained by issuers staking their SOL to support the Solana blockchain.

Spot Solana ETFs have yet to be approved in the United States. However, firms including VanEck, 21Shares, and Bitwise have filed applications with the Securities and Exchange Commission to launch such products.

Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETFs were both approved in the U.S. in 2024. Alongside Solana, issuers have filed to launch a potentially wide range of additional spot crypto funds in the States, including those tied to XRP, Dogecoin, and even President Donald Trump’s official Solana-based meme coin.

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