Institutional investors were the main drivers of the cryptocurrencies' growth in 2020 and 2021. The Grayscale trust fund alone acquired over 600,000 BTC (approximately $16 billion).

These market players' preferences can form a long-term trend. An analysis of investments in exchange-traded funds shows Solana overtaking Ethereum in 2023. 

Various funds have accumulated around $26 million in Solana over the past 12 months. The figure is modest but contrasts strongly with the outflow of $102 million from Ethereum and $51 million from Tron.

Investors favour Solana because it's one of few Layer-1 blockchains with high transaction completion speeds (just a few seconds), minimum fees (less than $0.01) and high protection (1,981 validators).

Solana was previously criticised because of constant failures, but it seems developers may have managed to normalise the network's operations. Its work has been stable for the past six months, resulting in beneficial business expansion. 

In August, the Solana Pay service was added by e-commerce platform Shopify, whose turnover exceeds $400 billion a year. In addition to that, yesterday, reports emerged about the blockchain's integration into Visa's payment system, leading to the coin strengthening slightly.

Visa uses the blockchain for instant and cheap intra-bank exchange transactions. Payments are made using the USDC stablecoin, around $700 million of which has already been minted by Solana.

If developers manage to provide reliable network operation, the network's partnership with such major players will attract additional attention. The low base effect is an additional motivation for investors, as SOL is trading at a 90% discount from its high. 

However, there's a factor limiting its growth. A court judgment on whether and how much to compensate FTX investors and clients for their losses is fast approaching. The collapsed crypto exchange is estimated to have $700 million worth of SOL in its accounts.

StormGain Analytical Group 
(platform for trading, exchanging and storing cryptocurrency)