Written by: kkk
On August 13, ETH strongly broke through $4,700, reaching a new high in four years, while SOL struggled, lingering around $200. In 2024, Pump.fun drove a meme frenzy throughout the Solana chain, and earlier this year, Trump launched $TRUMP on it, pushing the price of SOL to around $300, leading to a strong call for 'Solana to replace ETH'.
However, the reality of market trends has provided a calm response. Despite both ETH and SOL advancing treasury strategies simultaneously in an attempt to accumulate 'bullets' for their ecosystems, their performances have clearly diverged— the SOL/ETH exchange rate has fallen from 0.09 at the beginning of the year to 0.042, maintaining a weak pattern throughout the year. The reasons behind this may not only be price fluctuations but also a comprehensive reflection of differences in narrative heat, ecological structure, and capital expectations.
Treasury Strategy: The Dual Gap of Leadership and Capital Scale
On June 30, Wall Street's 'contrarian bull' Tom Lee parachuted into BitMine as chairman, while ETH lingered around $2,500 that day. Just a month and a half later, ETH soared to $4,700, an increase of 88%. Lee has long appeared on top financial programs such as CNBC and Bloomberg; back in 2022, during the significant drop in U.S. stocks, he reversed market pessimism with precise 'bottom-fishing' commentary. Now, this market opinion leader with a built-in following has become the best spokesperson for ETH's treasury. At the same time, ARK Invest, led by 'Cathie Wood', also invested $182 million to buy BMNR stock, adding more fire to ETH's camp.
Moreover, although both ETH and SOL have treasury strategy companies in their respective camps, the scale differs significantly. In terms of holdings, BTC and ETH treasury strategy companies dominate the top ten. 'ETH Microstrategy' leader BitMine Immersion (BMNR) recently planned to increase its financing scale by $20 billion to increase its ETH holdings while currently boasting a NAV (Net Asset Value) of $5.3 billion, second only to MSTR. This level of capital means it has more 'bullets' during market fluctuations and a stronger ability to shape market conditions. In contrast, the NAV of the leading 'SOL Microstrategy' is only $365 million, ranking 11th, over ten times less than BMNR. The lack of a globally influential public spokesperson like Tom Lee, combined with insufficient capital firepower, leaves SOL struggling in this market cycle.
However, recent new moves from Solana are gradually compensating for this deficiency. On August 12, 'SOL Microstrategy' Upexi established a new advisory committee and appointed Arthur Hayes as its first member. Hayes is the co-founder of BitMEX and the pioneer of perpetual contracts, having served as a trader at Deutsche Bank and Citigroup, and is now steering the digital asset investment fund Maelstrom. He possesses both traditional financial background and deep understanding of crypto market structure, able to provide practical guidance for institutional financing and digital asset strategies.
Upexi's strategic goal is clear: to leverage Solana's scalability and efficiency to further expand its layout in SOL. According to public documents, the company currently holds over 1.8 million SOL (valued at approximately $365 million) and will stake part of its holdings to earn a yield of 7%-9%, ensuring long-term holding while generating stable cash flow. Notably, the company will acquire locked SOL at discounted prices, bringing benefits to shareholders. Upexi plans to recruit more members to join the advisory committee to provide expertise in cryptocurrency and finance.
Meanwhile, other listed companies are also increasing their SOL holdings, such as DFDV further expanding its SOL holdings, with a total holding of over 1 million; BTCM disclosed the purchase of about 27,190 SOL and plans to convert some crypto assets into Solana. This institutional demand is expected to reduce the circulating chips in the secondary market, thereby providing support on the supply-demand level.
ETH ETF Leads, SOL ETF Awaits Breakthrough
The management scale of the ETH spot ETF has surpassed $22 billion, not only validating institutional recognition of ETH but also quickly establishing its absolute advantage in liquidity and market depth. With the continuous inflow of institutional capital, BlackRock also submitted an ETH ETF staking application last month, which, if approved, will provide stable staking returns for holders and attract more long-term capital.
In contrast, although REX-Osprey launched a Solana ETF (SSK) with a staking mechanism in July, market interest has remained low, with most trading days seeing zero net inflows; since its launch, it has accumulated only about $150 million in inflows, and it is not a standard spot ETF registered with the SEC but rather indirectly holds SOL through other vehicles. This structure combines staking mechanisms with offshore ETF configurations, increasing the complexity of understanding and operation, leading some institutions to remain on the sidelines. The issuer REX also lacks the brand and channel influence of Wall Street giants like BlackRock and Fidelity and has no heavyweight institutional endorsements.
Currently, the market's focus is shifting towards the SOL spot ETF applications expected to be approved in October by VanEck, Grayscale, and others. Once regulatory approval is granted, coupled with the capital push from treasury strategies, if institutional investors begin to seek diversification from BTC and ETH to other quality assets, the SOL ETF may bring new growth points to the Solana ecosystem.
Fork in the Application Narrative
From the perspective of application narratives, ETH and Solana are currently on two completely different tracks.
Ethereum is steadily building a compliant and sustainable on-chain financial infrastructure. The explosion of stablecoins has been described by Tom Lee as the ‘ChatGPT moment’ for the crypto industry. Currently, the global market value of stablecoins has surpassed $250 billion, with over half of the issuance and about 30% of Gas fees occurring on the Ethereum network. This not only further solidifies ETH's core position in payment and settlement systems but also provides a continuous cash flow for businesses such as staking, DeFi yields, and on-chain infrastructure.
Additionally, Robinhood has issued stock tokens on Ethereum Layer 2, and Coinbase is vigorously developing the Base chain ecosystem, all of which provide more application scenarios for ETH. Currently, Ethereum has almost become the only main chain that can simultaneously meet regulatory adaptability, ecological maturity, and scale effects. Once ETH occupies a critical node in stablecoin payments and RWA settlements, its strategic position will be prioritized by financial institutions, akin to a 'structured subscription right'.
On the Solana side, the main narrative is more focused on meme coins and Launchpad battles in high-volatility sectors, and despite several attempts this year to enter the RWA field, promoting a series of tokens such as $IBRL and Believe under the slogan of 'Internet Capital Market', all have ended in failure. However, recent developments have brought a turning point. On August 8, CMB International, a subsidiary of China Merchants Bank, partnered with Singapore's DigiFT and Solana public chain service provider OnChain to tokenize a USD money market fund recognized in Hong Kong and Singapore, issuing CMBMINT on-chain, establishing a benchmark for cross-border RWA compliance cooperation. On that day, the SOL price broke through $200, and the market immediately regarded it as a potential new narrative starting point, hoping that this new application scenario could open broader institutional funding channels for Solana.
Summary
Currently, although Solana still lags behind ETH in key indicators such as market heat and exchange rate performance, its underlying competitiveness and potential space have not been diminished. As an 'American chain', it inherently possesses higher regulatory adaptability and capital recognition. At present, ETH has gained institutional favor through treasury strategies, ETF trends, and RWA and stablecoin applications, but this also leaves room for SOL to catch up and switch narratives.
Structurally, the approval of a spot ETF is expected to open new institutional funding channels for SOL. Once products from giants like VanEck and Grayscale are approved, market liquidity and trading depth may experience a leap. The cross-border landing cases of RWA also prove that Solana's application capabilities on high-performance public chains are not limited to memes and Launchpads; there is still significant room for improvement in penetration rates in DeFi, payments, and asset tokenization in the future. The current pullback seems more like a buildup of strength rather than a curtain call.
