Founders of tasks within the Solana ecosystem embrace memecoins however say synthetic intelligence agents are overrated and fear concerning the community’s mounting most extractable worth (MEV) drawback, in accordance with survey information revealed on Jan. 3.
In a Blockworks Analysis survey of 42 founders on Solana, roughly 76% described memecoins as “principally good.” Additionally they expressed skepticism about AI agents, with 16% saying they’re “probably the most overrated Solana sector,” the survey discovered.
Moreover, the founders stated in the event that they couldn’t construct on Solana, they’d go for both Base, Coinbase’s Ethereum layer 2, or Sui, a layer 1 competing with Solana, in accordance with the survey.
Supply: Jack Kubinec
Associated: AI memecoins will become utility tokens
Memecoins, AI drive inflows
In 2024, Solana’s complete worth locked (TVL) had surged from round $1.5 billion in January to almost $8.5 billion by December, in accordance with information from DefiLlama.
Since 2023, Solana (SOL) has outperformed Ether (ETH) by roughly eight occasions, in accordance with information from TradingView.
Solana’s rise has largely been as a result of “retail merchants more and more enter the crypto market by means of Solana [as] hypothesis intensifies round Solana-based memecoins and AI agent tokens,” Grayscale said in a December research note.
In 2024, the full market capitalization of memecoins elevated from round $20 billion to greater than $120 billion, in accordance with information from CoinGecko.
Solana’s Pump.enjoyable has been a significant driver. The memecoin platform’s complete quantity has surpassed $8.5 billion since launching in January, according to DefiLlama. It has periodically surpassed the Ethereum network in 24-hour income.
In the meantime, tokens tied to AI agents — machines pursuing advanced targets autonomously — bootstrapped roughly $16 billion in combination market capitalization in 2024, largely through the fourth quarter, in accordance with CoinGecko.
Since October, AI agents have swarmed social media platform X, pumping practically a dozen extra cash previous $100-million market capitalizations, largely on Solana. They embody Zerebro (ZEREBRO), Fartcoin (FART) and ai16z (AI16Z).
Whereas “2025 might be large for AI agents […] crypto AI agents generally is a bubble should you take a look at simply the narrative, the place most are scams or won’t ever ship,” Condz, founding father of Web3 startup Acolyte AI, said in a Dec. 29 put up on X.
Supply: CoinGecko
Mounting MEV issues
In the meantime, a plurality of Solana founders — greater than 20% — recognized MEV or sandwiching as “Solana’s greatest difficulty.”
Customers pay validators tricks to prioritize transactions throughout block constructing and to order sure transactions forward of others inside blocks. This helps customers guarantee transactions are correctly executed but in addition contributes to greater transaction prices.
In 2024, Solana’s validators earned more from MEV than Ethereum’s for the first time. This coincided with transaction charges on the Solana community practically tripling, in accordance with information from Dune Analytics.
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