According to DefiLlama data, Solana has realized a total of over $109.8 billion in DEX trading volume so far in November. The recent surge represents an increase of over 100% compared to last month’s trading volume of $52.5 billion. The milestone marks a historic achievement for Solana, which illuminates its growing influence and adoption in the market.

The data also revealed that the monthly fees generated by Solana-based memecoin trading platforms Raydium and Pump.fun both hit record highs in November, $71.5 million and $182 million, respectively. In addition, Solana’s monthly DEX volume also nearly doubled that of Ethereum’s mainnet DEX volume of $55 billion.

Memecoin mania drives Solana’s trading volume higher

Memecoins have taken center stage in recent weeks, and Solana has benefited most from this surge. The Solana network witnessed significant activity from memecoins that pushed its monthly DEX volume over $100B. 

Solana (SOL) reached a new all-time high of $264 last week, according to CoinMarketCap data. SOL’s price dropped by 6.1% in the last 24 hours and is now trading below the $240 level in the short term. The fourth-largest cryptocurrency also gained 41.17% in the last month. Solana’s price has skyrocketed by 305.83% since November 2023, fueled by the rising prominence of Pump.fun, Solana’s top meme coin generator.

A Solana memecoin based on a squirrel called Peanut (PNUT) has rallied over 2,000% since its launch. The largest Solana memecoin, Dogwifhat, also got listed on Coinbase on Nov 15 and surged briefly to a new six-month high of $4.19 on the same day.

BONK also announced on November 15 its planned token burn. The token burn will see 1 trillion BONK tokens taken out of circulation before December 25. Such activities have all contributed to the heightened activities on the Solana blockchain. 

Patrick Scott, a DeFi commentator, also cited DefiLlama data and revealed on X that the memecoin frenzy from half of the top 10 crypto protocols generated by fees was on Solana.

Solana’s bullish momentum is also attributed to President-elect Donald Trump’s win in the just concluded 2024 U.S. Presidential elections. The demand for memecoins surged after Trump officially confirmed Elon Musk’s involvement in the proposed Department of Government Efficiency (D.O.G.E).

SOL’s DEX volume reflects rising interest in DeFi activities on Solana

The Solana network supports large-scale DeFi operations, attracting more projects to its ecosystem due to its relatively low fees. Data from Artemis revealed that Solana processes over $53 million in daily transactions, while most layer-1 blockchains manage less than $5 million in daily transactions.

The recent surge in SOL’s price can also be attributed to the rising anticipation of the potential approval of a spot Solana exchange-traded fund (ETF) in 2025. Fund manager VanEck filed an application for a spot SOL ETF with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in June this year.

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