Solana, a high-performance smart contracts platform was recently targeted by a second DDoS attack in three months.
DDoS attack clogged Solana network. IDOs in charge?
On Dec.10, the users of Solana-based wallet started reporting the delays in transactions. Blockasset, the platform for non-fungible tokens on Solana, was the first dApp to confirm the problems.
Also, this firm was the first one to identify ‘DDoS-attack’ as the potential trigger for network collapse. Many IDOs warned their investors about the possible delays with token distribution.
Instead, leading Solana-centric infrastructure community GenesysGo DAO attributed all issues to ‘growing pains’ of the blockchain and avoided calling them ‘DDoS-attack’. The Solana Foundation did not confirm the fact of the attack.
undefinedIn September, 2021, Solana network halted after the attacks from botnet farms participating in the initial decentralized exchange offering (IDO) on Raydium platform.
However, the December collapse didn’t result in network outage: the consensus worked slowly but still processed all transactions sent.
Solana’s tokens are witnessing double-digit losses
December is really bloody for the majority of tokens in Solana’s ecosystem. Its core native utility token SOL is currently changing hands at $152 being almost 42% down from all times high.
Historic high for SOL price was registered on November 6, 2021 over $260.
To provide the context, Ethereum is only 21.32% down while Bitcoin prints 31% losses in the last 30 days. At the same time, Polkadot (DOT) and Cardano (ADA) tokens are the worst performers in the top league with their 50% and 60% losses respectively.
Other notable tokens of Solana’s ecosystem plummeted even deeper: SRM of Serum DEX lost 75,26% since all-times-high while Raydium’s RAY is 60% down. SOLR, an utility token of Solana-based IDO launchpad SolRazr, is the worst performer here with 96.82% losses.
Builders keep build
At the same time, it’s not all bad news in Solana’s segment. According to the Santiment data, Solana’s GitHub activity is rocketing following the mitigated DDoS attacks. In the last 30 days, Solana’s developers authored more GitHub commits than their colleagues of Polkadot (DOT) and Cardano (ADA).
Such an impressive spike had no chances to be left unseen by investors. Grayscale, an operator of crypto-centric ‘over-the-counter’ ETF products, launched a special trust for SOL tokens.
undefinedNewly-launched Grayscale Solana Trust is projected to allow retail and institutional investors to gain an exposure to crypto prices fluctuations without buying and holding tokens directly. This allows them to circumvent legal, tax, and technical barriers for investors of all sorts.
Grayscale offers the suite of ETF-like products for all mainstream cryptocurrencies and integral indexes for large-caps and DeFi tokens. Grayscale indexes are available on the U.S.-based OTC exchanges.
All in all, despite the overall crypto bloodbath of recent days, technical problems with throughput, and pale performance of major assets, the Solana (SOL) ecosystem still looks attractive for researchers and investors.
As of Q4, 2021, GetBlock’s Solana node infrastructure is under construction. If you’re interested in becoming a pioneer of GetBlock’s Solana dedicated node, please reach our representatives in Telegram.
