My Top Altcoin Pick for the Next Crypto Bull Run

The total cryptocurrency market cap is $2.5 trillion at the time of this writing on June 2. It has fallen almost 30% in the past year and is a long way from last year's high of over $4.3 trillion, making it hard to imagine when the next bull run might come.

However, not only does history tell us that prices are likely to recover, but the price slump also belies the regulatory and systemic shifts that have taken place in the past few years, making blockchain fundamentals the strongest they've ever been.

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When prices do rebound, Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) is well-positioned to outperform, making it a good cryptocurrency investment. Here's why it is my pick for the next crypto bull run.

Two reasons why Solana could soar

Solana has the reputation, staying power, and proven capabilities to succeed. In addition to its speed, which sets it apart from other blockchains, it has developed resilience and built crucial commercial partnerships.

1. It has established its credentials, but still has room to grow

The best altcoins -- like Solana -- occupy the sweet spot between risk and reward: They are established enough to reduce some of the risk but still small enough to have serious growth potential. For example, Solana's market cap is around $46 billion -- about 20% of Ethereum's (CRYPTO: ETH). It is also one of the few top cryptocurrencies from five years ago that have significantly increased in value. Solana has gained more than 160% since June 1, 2021.

Its credentials go further than price performance. Only Ethereum and Bitcoin have more full-time developers working on their ecosystems. It has been battle-tested, processing a record of over 110 million transactions in a single day in February. For context, Ethereum processes between 2 million and 4 million a day. And it keeps improving -- the upcoming Alpenglow upgrade aims to make it faster and more reliable. These are all signals that Solana can go higher.

2. It is emerging as a credible alternative to Ethereum

Solana is fast enough to rival traditional payment processors. According to research from The Motley Fool, it has near-instant settlement, and transaction fees are a fraction of a cent. That makes it ideally suited for volume-heavy applications like payments, trading, artificial intelligence agents, and more.

Although Ethereum still dominates, accounting for over 50% of funds deposited on decentralized finance platforms, Solana has edged out many competitors. It is in third place in terms of funds on its ecosystem, issuance of stablecoins, and total tokenized assets, all of which will be crucial to any mainstream adoption and fuel future growth.

It may look like Solana's taking a lot of bronze medals without any clear wins. Still, I see that as a sign of all-around strength, particularly as Solana has several stablecoin partnerships with traditional financial firms. Western Union built its stablecoin on Solana, while SoFi launched on Solana and Ethereum.

Solana has the potential to shine again

All altcoins face challenges. For Solana, which experienced outages in its early years, any new technical issues would hamper its growth. However, it seems to have put those initial issues behind it with recent upgrades focused on resilience and security.

Slow regulatory progress and an inflationary macroeconomic backdrop will likely pressure crypto prices in the near term. When the next bull run comes, Solana could soar once again.

Emma Newbery has positions in Ethereum and Solana. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.