Solana DEX volumes drop to 2024 lows: Will SOL hold $80 as support?

Key takeaways:

• Solana outperforms Ethereum in high-revenue DApps, providing a fundamental cushion against recent price drops.

• Rising Ethereum Layer-2 dominance challenges SOL as traders monitor the critical $80 support level for a retest.

Solana’s native token, SOL (SOL), faced an 11% correction following a rejection at $93 on last Wednesday. SOL has lagged the broader cryptocurrency market over the past week, testing the $80 support on multiple occasions. Solana network fees have also declined over the past two months, leading traders to fear a potential retest of the $75 level.

The total value locked (TVL) on Solana stood at $6.3 billion, though the gap remains wide compared to Ethereum’s $54.1 billion. However, Solana amassed 80% more network fees than its main competitor over the last 30 days. This difference is largely due to Ethereum’s incentives for layer-2 rollups, which utilize temporary data blobs to lower costs.

Network fees on Solana dropped to $18.5 million in March, a 42% decrease from January’s $30 million level. Most of this decline stems from lower activity in decentralized exchange (DEX) volumes. Despite maintaining leadership in absolute terms, Solana DEX volumes plummeted to $55.5 billion, their lowest levels since September 2024, according to DefiLlama data.

In comparison, Ethereum DEX volumes totaled $41 billion in March, down 23% from two months prior. More importantly, when aggregating Ethereum layer-2 blockchains like Base, Arbitrum, Polygon, and Optimism, Ethereum’s DEX market share jumped to 42% in March from 33% in January. Solana’s dominance is gradually being challenged, which partially explains SOL’s current bearish momentum.

Solana DApps revenue could solidify SOL’s $80 support level

While DEX volumes on Solana are declining, no other network matches its number of DApps earning $1 million or more in 30 days. This data serves as a strong incentive for developers to join Solana, creating opportunities for user returns through protocols like Pump, Helium Network and ORE Protocol. Since protocol revenues drive investor attention, a healthy ecosystem remains extremely important for SOL’s upside.

Related: Solana lands Mastercard, Western Union on new dev platform

Solana leads the pack with 13 DApps ranking $1 million or more in revenue over the past 30 days. As a comparison, the runner-up Ethereum had 11 DApps, while BNB Chain and Base totaled 4 DApps each with $1 million or higher in monthly revenue. Thus, there is little evidence that the SOL price is bound to retest $75 solely because of lower network fees driven by weak DEX volumes.

DEX activity is a major driver of network fees, but the sustainability of protocols within the Solana ecosystem demonstrates that SOL is far from abandoned by investors.