Solana could become the ‘Visa of crypto’, says Bank of America

• Solana volition curve disconnected Ethereum’s marketplace stock to spot Visa-like transactions, says BofA strategist Alkesh Shah.

• He cites advantages specified arsenic scalability, debased fees and easiness of usage arsenic what makes Solana a apical blockchain for micropayments, DeFi, and NFTs.

• Solana (SOL) terms surged astir 10% to $157 earlier paring gains connected Thursday afternoon.

Solana could gradually nip astatine the marketplace stock of starring astute contracts level Ethereum and go the “Visa of the Digital Asset ecosystem,” according to Bank of America.

Alkesh Shah, a crypto strategist astatine the concern bank, says that Solana’s vantage implicit the Ethereum blockchain is down to 3 things: precocious scalability, precise debased transaction fees, and easiness of use.

The Bank of America strategist said successful a probe note quoted by Business Insider that these factors could perchance propulsion Solana to heights that marque it ‘Visa of crypto.’

While respective outages implicit the past fewer months person shown the blockchain is yet to surmount usage challenges, Shah says the existent outlook makes for a greater future for the network.

He said successful the probe enactment that “[Solana’s] precocious throughput, debased cost, and easiness of use” person created a level optimized for respective usage cases.

Other than micropayments, the blockchain is already commanding immense usage numbers successful presumption of consumers and developers for decentralized concern (DeFi), non-fungible tokens (NFTs), gaming and Web3.

In its predictions for 2022 past December, Arcane Research said Solana and different layer-1 blockchain platforms could outperform Ethereum.

Solana’s “Visa of crypto” comparison

The Solana blockchain is simply a proof-of-stake web that officially launched successful 2020, with SOL arsenic the autochthonal token. Since then, the SOL token has seen monolithic maturation to spot the blockchain fertile among the apical 10 by marketplace cap.

Visa is simply a starring payments steadfast with a planetary presence, settling billions of transactions annually. Last year, the payments giant announced it had processed implicit 164 cardinal transactions.

In comparison, Solana’s blockchain saw implicit 50 cardinal transactions, with maturation besides seen crossed the spike successful NFTs and Total Value Locked astatine 5.7 cardinal and $11 cardinal respectively.

While Visa tin grip up to 24,000 transactions per 2nd (TPS), Solana’s tin spell up to 65,000 TPS. Ethereum, connected the different hand, processes 12 TPS on-chain and tin standard much with furniture 2 options.

Such numbers springiness Solana the weapons to devour into Ethereum’s market. However, Shah noted that portion the level holds the precocious manus successful velocity and debased costs, determination are “trade-offs” erstwhile it comes to decentralization and security.

Solana’s terms surged aft the BofA news, with SOL concisely the apical gainer among the 10 largest coins by marketplace cap. The SOL/USD brace rallied much than 9% successful aboriginal deals connected Thursday earlier paring immoderate of the gains made to intraday highs of $157.

As of writing, the cryptocurrency was trading astir $151.