This Week In Solana (Feb 17-23rd 2025)
Solana had some rough weekly sentiment with the $LIBRA token and exposure of insiders dumping on everyone in a highly coordinated way. We need to flush out these bad actors. The news impacted the price of SOL which dropped from $195 down to $160, before rebounding above $170. All of the users are on Solana this cycle, so we will continue to see scams pop up.
It was Ethereum before with ICO’s, DEFI summer and NFT scams when they had the public mindshare. Crime will always be drawn like a moth to a flame to whatever chain has the users at the moment. The easiest way to avoid scam/rug tokens is to simply not buy them.
Days later, ByBit got hit with the largest every crypto theft in history, with North Korean hacker group, Lazarus stealing 1.5 billion dollars worth of $ETH
Jupiter (@JupiterExchange) introduced organic token scores (green leaf) to show when you search for a token to help guide you to buying the right tokens and not a copycat.
Jupiter’s Ultra Mode is now 40% faster and if you have 0 SOL in your wallet, it'll automatically use JupiterZ to do a gasless swap. You can still swap with only USDC in your wallet.
Jupiter Mobile (@jup_mobile ) now works with Saga Phone seed vaults
Six @solana ETFs have been filed with a deadline for response by the SEC due by mid October. Grayscale was the first to submit and will have a response by Oct 10th.
Companies looking for an ETF approval are Grayscale, Vaneck, Canary, Bitwise. Fidelity and 21Shares.
Phantom Wallet (@phantom) and Backpack (@Backpack) introduced Monad(@monad_xyz) testnet.
If you have been or ever have native/vanilla staked $SOL tokens, make sure to check Jito’s (@jito_sol) MEV harvesting to claim $SOL back to your wallet - https://www.jito.network/harvest/
Jito also has their re-staking live (https://www.jito.network/restaking/) and you can choose to re-stake JitoSol, JTO, SOL or mSOL currently, with more coming soon. There are currently 9 vaults to choose from, with the TVL listed. Rewards come from supporting the Node Consensus Networks (NCNs), which are services that provide blockchain infrastructure such as validators, oracles, bridges, and L2s. They use staking mechanisms to ensure network security.
Big news for Helium in Mexico. Movistar is bringing 2.3M subscribers to @helium with Hotspots available in retail and online stores to drive coverage in over 300 locations
Sanctum (@sanctumso) introduced staking (https://vote.sanctum.so/) of their $CLOUD token. Staking Scores (not live yet), in addition to participation, determines your share of future Active Staking Rewards (ASR) based on amount × duration staked. You receive sCLOUD token back into your wallet for all staked tokens (currently shows no $ value in your wallet). Unstaking takes 30 days, similar to governance on @JupiterExchange
Crossmint (@crossmint) teamed up with @SquadsProtocol and @heliuslabs to create smart wallets on Solana. Smart wallets are programmable, gasless and with their infra, can be deployed in 10 lines of code. https://www.crossmint.com/
The @SECGov has launched the Cyber & Emerging Technologies Unit (CETU). CETU aims to combat fraud in crypto & protect investors in emerging technologies like AI, blockchain, and cybersecurity compliance.
Phantom (@phantom) now supports ZK Compression from Light Protocol (@LightProtocol). This reduces token costs dramatically for SPL tokens. ZK Compression gets costs as low as 0.000001 SOL. Apps like @tribedotrun and AirShip by @heliuslabs already use compressed tokens to scale
Kamino (@KaminoFinance) added more liquidity pairs for re-staked JitoSol pairs (ezSOL, kySOL, wfragSOL which all have different incentive programs for token rewards or points. https://app.kamino.finance/liquidity (needs VPN if in the USA). $JLP multiply increased to a max 4x (25% increase).
Stable Coin yields
LULO (@uselulo)
USDC - 7.95%,
PYUSD - 8.27%
USDS - 9.19%
Kamino (@KaminoFinance)
USDC/USDS - 11.49% rewards in USDS
FDUSD/USDC - 8.74%/ 10.31% (two pools)
PYUSD/USDC - 1.69%
Marginfi (@marginfi)
USDC - 6.7%
USDS - 5.9%
PYUSD - 7.3%
Defi Carrot (@DeFiCarrot) - CRT token - 7.6%
Perena (@Perena__) - USD* - 1.2% APY
Price movements
Sol - Down 11.08% on the week
Eth - Up 4.37% on the week
BTC - Down 0.93% on the week