Solana’s DeFi vertical has witnessed significant growth in the last month.Solana’s TVL is at its highest level since October 2022.The chain’s DEX trading volume recently touched its year-to-date high.Solana’s [$SOL ] decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem has experienced a surge of activity in the past two months, with its total value locked (TVL) reaching its highest point since the year began, according to data from DeFiLlama.At press time, Solana’s TVL was $1.30 billion. The last time the network’s TVL was this high was in October 2022.For context, as of 1st January, the network’s TVL was a mere $210 million, showing that Solana’s TVL has witnessed a year-to-date (YTD) growth of 519%. Over the past month alone, Solana’s DeFi vertical has witnessed an impressive 130% growth. This is in tandem with the network-wide growth that the Layer 1 (L1) blockchain network has seen within that period.Leading DeFi protocols on Solana, such as Marinade Finance, Jito, and Marginfi, have witnessed respective TVL growths of 87%, 55%, and 165% in the last 30 days.Solana aims to close the year with a bangThe month so far has seen a remarkable uptick in the demand for the network. An assessment of the chain’s network activity revealed that its daily count of active addresses climbed to a YTD high of 1.26 million on 17th December. While this has seen a slight retracement, Solana’s daily active address count has increased by 157% since the beginning of the month.When a network’s user count increases, it sees a corresponding transaction increment. On Solana, the total number of transactions registered on-chain daily has gone up by 23% since 1st December.As for the decentralized exchanges (DEXes) on Solana, the trade volume executed through them touched a YTD high of 2.61 billion on 22nd December, according to data from Artemis.This marked a whopping 17,000% in DEX trading volume on Solana so far this year. As a result of the increased activity on Solana in the last 30 days, monthly fees generated from users currently sit at its highest since the year began. According to data from Token Terminal, so far this month, Solana’s transaction fees have totaled $3.7 million.The monthly revenue derived from the same has also been at its highest since January. With a week left till the close of the 2023 trading year, the network has seen a monthly revenue of $1.9 million.#Sol #SolanaGems #Solana.blockchain #solanaphone #sol

Former Goldman Sachs executive Raoul Pal is predicting that #Ethereum ($ETH ) will outperform #Bitcoin ($BTC ) in 2024.The Real Vision CEO tells his one million followers on the social media platform X that Ethereum against Bitcoin (ETH/BTC) may repeat a similar 2021 bull market price pattern next year.“For all the ETH bears, in February 2021, BTC first hit $44,000 (where it is today) and ETH was at $1,400 (now $2,250). Nine months later ETH was up 245%, BTC was up 45%. I think ETH outperforming BTC will be a key macro trend of 2024 and our work at EXPAAM (Exponential Age Asset Management) suggests it.”ETH/BTC is trading for 0.05288 BTC ($2,314) at time of writing.The analyst believes that more favorable macroeconomic conditions for risk assets like Ethereum are on the horizon that will send ETH soaring similar to the way it did two years ago.“It’s all about liquidity and the business cycle leading the risk curve. Narrative follows.”The analyst also says he believes that ETH competitor #Solana ($SOL ) will outperform Ethereum in 2024.When asked by a social media user, “Do you think ETH will somehow outperform SOL in 2024?” Pal answered, “No.”SOL/ETH is trading for 0.0419 ETH ($97.01) at time of writing. SOL has surged from $9.99 at the beginning of the year, a more than 871% gain from its current value.