Greed has returned to the market, charging up L1s in response.
TL;DR…
- L1 Overview: Solana (+21.5%) and Cardano (+39.7%) led smart contract platform gains; key movers include Avalanche (+1) and Stellar (+4).
- Sui Suffers Outage: SUI up 877.9% from bottom; FDUSD stablecoin launched to boost DeFi; Nov. 21 outage resolved quickly.
- Solana Hits ATH: SOL sits at $259.40 (+21.5%), breaking prior ATH; four spot ETF filings submitted.
- Hedera’s Resurrection: HBAR soared 85.2% as Canary Capital filed for HBAR spot ETF.
Greed has returned to the market, charging up L1s in response.
In this week’s recap, we see how two of the biggest Ethereum competitors (Solana and Sui) have fared, while catching up with an older L1 giant that recently exploded.
>> Miss last week’s L1 recap? Check it out here.
L1 Overview:
According to DefiLlama's narrative tracker, smart contract platforms (mostly consisting of layer-1 blockchains) are the sixth-best performing crypto-asset sector by mCap-weighted returns.
Source: DefiLlama
The sector achieved a seven-day mCap-weighted return of 11.6%. For comparison, the real-world asset (RWA) sector is currently leading by mCap-weighted growth, at 32.2%.
>> Read this week’s RWA recap for more.
As of writing, every L1 asset in the top 10 by market capitalization is in the green this week. Solana (SOL) and Cardano (ADA) stand out as particularly strong performers, netting a 21.5% and 39.7% return, respectively.
Source: Top L1 Tokens Page
In terms of movers and losers, we find that several L1 tokens have shifted positions in the rankings since the last historical snapshot.
These include:
- Avalanche (AVAX): Jumped from 12th to 11th position
- Stellar (XLM): Jumped from 23rd to 19th position
- Aptos (APT): Dropped from 22nd to 23rd position
- Cronos (CRO): Dropped from 26th to 27th position
>> Keep tabs on your favorite L1 tokens here.
Sui
Widely acknowledged as one of the best-performing L1 tokens of this cycle, the SUI token is currently up 877.9% since its all-time low seen in October 2023.
SUI is now trading at $3.53, after recovering from a dip to $3.35 yesterday following a network outage (more on this shortly).
Source: SUI Token Page
The SUI token has been on an almost unbroken uptrend for the past nine months, barely dipping during periods that crushed many other alts.
In terms of total value locked (TVL), the Sui Network has also shown serious strength.
Source: DefiLlama
Earlier this week, the platform touched a record high TVL of over $1.65 billion and is now hovering just below this figure. This has been largely driven by the meteoric rise of Aftermath Finance, which saw its TVL swell by 78.3% in the last week.
Here are the most significant Sui ecosystem news stories for this week:
Sui Network Suffers Major Outage: On Nov. 21, 2024, the Sui blockchain experienced a two-hour outage due to a bug in its congestion control system, which caused validators to crash and halted block production. The issue was swiftly resolved, restoring normal network operations. This was the first extended outage suffered by the network since its mainnet launched in May 2023.
FDUSD Goes Live on the Sui Network: First Digital's FDUSD stablecoin has been integrated into the Sui blockchain, becoming its second native stablecoin. This partnership aims to enhance Sui's DeFi ecosystem by providing a stable, interoperable asset for transactions and liquidity. Like many other USD-pegged stablecoins, FDUSD is backed by user-deposited cash and cash equivalents.
Solana
Solana (SOL) made headlines this week after breaking its long-standing all-time high of $249.98 achieved back in November 2021.
Source: SOL Token Page
As of writing, the SOL token is trading at $259.40 but reached a peak of $263.70 earlier today. It’s up a whopping 21.5% in the last week, making it one of the best-performing large-cap cryptocurrencies recently.
Though the token just broke its ATH, its market capitalization has been breaking back-to-back highs for more than a year, due to inflation of the SOL supply.
Solana's TVL has also been on the up-and-up recently. It's up 16.8% in a week and 49.2% in a month.
All of Solana’s top DeFi protocols have grown over the last week, but the decentralized exchange Raydium led the pack with a 23.8% gain.
Here are the most significant Solana ecosystem news stories for this week:
Solana Gets Several Spot ETF Filings in the U.S: Four investment firms—VanEck, 21Shares, Bitwise, and Canary Capital—have filed for spot Solana (SOL) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), aiming to list them on the Cboe BZX Exchange.
Sky's USDS Stablecoin Launches on Solana: Sky, formerly Maker, has launched its USDS stablecoin on the Solana blockchain, marking the first major DeFi-native stablecoin on Solana. This integration aims to enhance Solana's DeFi ecosystem by providing new lending, borrowing, and trading opportunities.
Hedera
In a move that shocked many, Hedera (HBAR) is this week's best-performing large-cap L1 asset—gaining a staggering 85.2% in a week and erasing more than six months of decline.
Source: HBAR Token Page
This move saw the token leap to an almost $5 billion market cap.
Despite launching more than five years ago, Hedera has been often criticized for its rather limited DApp ecosystem.
Source: DefiLlama
Nonetheless, the platform has seen its TVL swell by a third over the last week as protocols like SaucerSwap and Stader spiked.
The recent resurrection appears to be related to a simultaneous XRP and Stellar (XLM) pump, which was at least partially driven by news of SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s impending resignation.
Besides this, one major news story likely contributed to renewed excitement around the platform:
Hedera in Line for Potential U.S. Spot ETF: On Nov. 12, 2024, Canary Capital filed an S-1 registration with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch a Hedera HBAR spot exchange-traded fund (ETF), aiming to provide investors direct exposure to HBAR's value.
>> That’s all we’ve got for you this week. Join us next week for another dose of L1 news, updates and developments.
>> For more reading, see our recent RWA and AI sector recaps.
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