Coinbase, the top US-based cryptocurrency exchange, has added wallet support for Solana (SOL) and its ecosystem of Solana tokens (SPL).
It has been reported that Coinbase cited the surging interest in Solana over the past 12 months as investors look for low-cost alternatives to Ethereum as a key reason behind adding support to the network. The expanded wallet support comes just a few days after the firm launched Coinbase Pay, enabling users to fund their wallets directly through a web browser extension.
However, the firm also loosely outlined plans to “further integrate” with Solana by connecting the Coinbase Wallet with decentralized applications (DApps) and nonfungible tokens (NFTs) hosted on the network, which is famously championed by FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.
The report said that after the addition of the Solana network, the Coinbase Wallet now supports Ethereum, Avalanche, Polygon, BNB Chain, Bitcoin (BTC), Dogecoin (DOGE), Litecoin (LTC), Stellar Lumens, and the Ripple network.
Coinbase stated:
"Many users have been looking for networks that are optimized for scale, offering low-cost transactions and fast transaction times. One of the fastest-growing blockchains over the past year has been Solana."
Likewise, according to data from DefiLlama, the Solana blockchain is currently ranked fifth in terms of total value locked (TVL) in decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols at $6.94 billion. NFT data aggregator CryptoSlam ranked it as the second-highest blockchain for secondary sales volume last month at $156.28 million.
Thus, much like the majority of the crypto market which has had a torrid performance this year, the price of SOL is down 18% over the past 30 days to sit at $85.90, as of March 18.
Source: Cointelegraph