Solana

Solana is a Layer 1 blockchain network designed to host decentralized applications at high speed and low cost without splitting the network into shards or separate layers. It targets developers and users who need a single, unified environment capable of processing a large volume of transactions quickly. The project positions itself as infrastructure for mass adoption of on-chain applications, from financial protocols to consumer products.

Solana combines Proof of Stake with a mechanism called Proof of History, which acts as a decentralized clock that timestamps transactions and reduces the need for continuous communication between nodes. A parallel execution engine called Sealevel runs non-conflicting smart contracts simultaneously across multiple processor cores, while the Gulf Stream protocol forwards pending transactions to validators before the current block is closed, contributing to a recent sample throughput of 4,470.55 transactions per second and block times measured in fractions of a second. SOL, the native token, is used to pay transaction fees, to stake as collateral by validators who process and confirm transactions, and as the staking asset by the 68.9 percent of circulating supply currently delegated to validators.

Fees are paid by users and applications submitting transactions to the network; over the trailing 7 days the network collected $5,833,930 in fees, and over the trailing 30 days it collected $27,992,579, with fees growing 30 percent over that same 30-day period. Of those 30-day fees, the protocol itself retained $3,301,513 as protocol revenue, a take rate of approximately 11.8 percent, while the remaining majority flowed to validators as supply-side revenue, which totalled $24,691,066 over the trailing 30 days. Annualizing from the trailing 30 days produces a fee figure of $340,576,377.83 and a protocol revenue figure of $40,168,408.17, which the site uses to compute ratios such as market-cap-to-fees of 185.55 and market-cap-to-revenue of 1,573.26. The annual inflation rate for the current epoch stands at 3.60 percent, meaning new SOL is continuously issued to reward validators, and the nominal staking yield is 4.60 percent against a real staking yield, net of that issuance, of 0.99 percent.