Layer 1 Crypto Token Surge Brings 200% Gains During August

Arcane Research recently published a crypto market update and explored the rise of layer 1 tokens over the past 30 days. The season of “ETH Killers” as the research firm and many others have called them.

Although the second cryptocurrency by market cap was leading the crypto market up until a few weeks ago, its competitors have been gaining traction, smashing all resistance towards new all-time highs.

As seen in the chart below, some layer 1 tokens in the crypto market have experienced massive rallies in August.

Solana (SOL) leads the chart with a 221% rally, followed by Terra (LUNA) with a 217% rally, Fantom (FTM), and Avalanche (AVAX), sit at the last spots of the biggest layer 1 tokens with a 215% and 210% rally, respectively.

Source: Arcane Research

Binance Coin (BNB, 38%), Ethereum (ETH, 28%), and Polygon (MATIC, 22%), also made the cut with important profits in the same period.

Crypto exchange Binance’s token slowed down on its late 2020 rally. Similar to SOL, LUNA, and AVAX, BNB surged on the back of the DeFi boom as users migrated to the Binance Smart Chain ecosystem due to its high fees.

Solana seems to have taken part in its market share. Arcane Research noted the increase in this token’s market from $9.5 billion to $35 billion in one month. SOL climbed its way to the 8th position in the crypto top 10 by market cap.

The report attributes SOL’s appreciation to its high throughput of 50,000 transactions per second with low fees when compared to Ethereum. This has made Solana attractive for developers.

As NewsBTC reported, some experts believe SOL will be one of the best performing crypto assets of 2021. Despite its 221% rally in August, there seems to be room for more appreciation based on the token’s growing fundamentals.

Ethereum, King Of Crypto In The DeFi Sector

The DeFi and the increase in adoption of the non-fungible tokens (NFTs) sector could determine which crypto will dominate the market in the coming months.

In that sense, the total value locked (TVL), a controversial metric due to its “sketchy” accuracy, in Solana recently surpassed the $2 billion mark.

However, Arcane Research claims that no layer 1 network will be able to outperform Ethereum in terms of DeFi market share. Data from DeFi Pulse record a TVL of $89 billion for all DeFi protocols.

The Ethereum network has supremacy in this sector, the most popular dApps are hosted on its ecosystem. Aave, MakerDAO, Curve Finance, Compound, Uniswap, Yearn Finance, SushiSwap.

Source: DeFi Pulse

These protocols have a total value locked (TVL) ranging from $4.2 to $15.86 billion. The smallest DeFi protocol in the Ethereum top 10 by TVL has double that held on Solana, Arcane Research claimed:

ETH has experience growing transaction fees amid the NFT frenzy, possibly attracting more users to other chains. However, in the ecosystem overall, Ethereum remains the clear leader, and it seems unlikely that any other protocol will dethrone Ethereum’s position in the near future.

At the time of writing, ETH trades at $3,398. The second crypto by market cap has a 5.2% profit in the daily chart.

ETH with moderate profits in the daily chart. Source: ETHUSD Tradingview