Layer-1 blockchain Solana (SOL) led the way in 2023 in terms of token price gains, with other altcoins Avalanche (AVAX), Stacks (STX) and Helium\u2019s (HNT) following closely behind. The digital asset gains came as the largest cryptocurrency by market value, bitcoin (BTC), also witnessed a strong year amid growing optimism that spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) will be approved early in the new year.Solana, which began its sharp increase in mid-October, has gained over 700% since the start of the year. The rally was unaffected by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission naming the token among other cryptos as \u201cunregistered securities,\u201d in a complaint against cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase in June.Solana also fared well despite its relationship with collapsed exchange FTX and its founder Sam Bankman-Fried, whose trial ended in November. Bankman-Fried was a prominent backer of Solana and acquired over $1 billion worth of the tokens through his companies Alameda Research and FTX.Most of SOL\u2019s gains came following the conclusion of the trial. The network has since seen increased growth in monthly active addresses and the launch of several memecoins including BONK, which was listed recently on crypto exchange Coinbase.\u201cThere were real questions around Solana\u2019s survival after the collapse of FTX, but it has instead thrived with increasing activity on the chain, a newfound appreciation for its innovative technology, and several high profile airdrops,\u201d said Brian Rudick, a senior strategist at GSR.HNTHelium\u2019s HNT also made considerable gains in 2023, most of them in December, following the company\u2019s move into the mobile space. HNT gained 500% over the year. Helium migrated to Solana in April from its own blockchain. Helium is a blockchain-based network for Internet of Things devices that uses nodes as hotspots to connect wireless devices to the network.According to Christopher Martin, director of research at Amberdata, 2023 was a huge year for Helium because of its jump into the mobile sector. \u201cThe network seems to have major plans in mobile and IoT, and allowing mobile plan users to earn tokens (MOBILE) by supporting the network and pay the monthly bill with them, creates a flywheel effect for the network,\u201d said Martin.He also noted that \u201cthe recent BONK craze has led the Solana Saga phone to sell out (since the phones come with a BONK claim), which also has a free 30-day subscription to Helium Mobile,\u201d said Martin. \u201cIn short, there’s a lot of anticipation for MOBILE and HNT to grow with the mobile network due to the symbiotic relationship between the network benefits of user growth.\u201dAVAXFor Avalanche, there have been a number of institutional partnerships that helped lift the token. AVAX has gained 300% year-to-date. Avalanche announced a partnership with Amazon Web Services in January and was part of J.P. Morgan and Apollo Global’s blockchain platform, Onyx\u2019s proof-of-concept project in November.Chris Newhouse, a former derivatives trader and the founder of Infiniti Labs, a DeFi advisory and consulting firm, said Avalanche\u2019s rally this year has mostly been down to trading on news. \u201cAlthough this time, I\u2019d argue this isn\u2019t ALL due to the alt L1 narrative that was previously traded in the last cycle (SoLunAvax) where people were just rotating in and out of different L1s and altcoins,\u201d\u201cAvalanche has made massive strides with institutional partnerships, associating themselves with Apollo and JP Morgan, as well as a previous AWS partnership made at the beginning of the year, and is shaping itself to be one of the best chains conducive to institutional activity,\u201d said Newhouse in an interview with Crypto.Bitcoin also had a strong year in terms of price action, mainly due to enthusiasm surrounding a potential spot bitcoin ETF. The cryptocurrency has gained 164% year-to-date. Rudick said in an interview that the ETF hype was the main catalyst, but a supportive macroeconomic environment helped as well.STXStacks (STX), the native token of Stacks Network, gained 623% over the year. The token rallied in March amid booming hype for Bitcoin Ordinals, a way to inscribe data to the Bitcoin blockchain, and growing total value locked (TVL) on the protocol.Stacks is known for being the first token distributed through the first-ever U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) qualified token offering in 2019. Stacks is a Bitcoin layer-2 protocol for smart contracts that\u2019s attempting to transform and extend Bitcoin\u2019s functionality from its widely known role as an alternative payment system to a more versatile, programmable platform.Stacks Network\u2019s TVL has surged over the year too, climbing to $50 million from $6 million in January, according to data from DeFiLlama.More recently, Stacks jumped by 27% on Wednesday following a series of positive comments from veteran investor Tim Draper.2024 PredictionsRudick said he expects to see bitcoin and ether (ETH) continue to rally in the new year, helped in part by inflows of likely approvals of spot bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. He also noted that in 2024, \u201cwe see decentralized identity ushering in a new wave of blockchain users given plans or announced interest from China, the EU, Brazil, and others.\u201dMartin said that aside from the ETF focus early in the new year, real-world assets will be the booming segment to watch. \u201cWe\u2019ve seen the foundations being set up this year but we haven’t seen the mainstream catch up just yet.\u201dNewhouse said, looking forward, the \u201cDecentralized Physical Infrastructure (DePIN) narrative\u201d will continue to be a hot topic, with tokens such as RNDR and HNT recently outperforming the market. DePINs use cryptocurrency tokens to incentivize building of real-world infrastructure.\u201cTraditional fund managers have also expressed interest specific in HNT, with Bill Ackman supporting the token in 2022,\u201d Newhouse added.Edited by Benjamin Schiller.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Layer-1 blockchain Solana (SOL) led the way in 2023 in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1382,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bot.cryptoinn.trade\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}