**Solana Officially Promotes Time.fun**
On February 24, following the official launch of the time tokenization platform Time.fun on Solana, the Solana official team quickly provided strong support, with even Solana co-founder Toly frequently mentioning it in tweets, ensuring ample market exposure. This move not only serves as a robust response to the liquidity drain caused by Pump.fun, but also represents another exploration of growth after the Solana ecosystem was significantly impacted by the chaos surrounding celebrity token launches.
**Pump.fun Seeks to “Flip the Table,” Crisis in Solana Ecosystem Intensifies**
After scandals involving celebrity coins like Libra, Solana’s liquidity was rapidly withdrawn, and market sentiment remained persistently low. As a traffic engine for the Solana ecosystem in this cycle and an on-chain “money printer,” the current state of this protocol has made it difficult to continue providing liquidity. Multiple factors, including rumors of building its own AMM, token issuance, ongoing token sell-offs, and uncertainties surrounding regulatory lawsuits, have also drawn Solana officials’ “discontent.”
In January of this year, Pump.fun’s business, which had been growing steadily, unfortunately encountered a lawsuit. According to a Bloomberg Law report at the time, Pump.fun faced a class action lawsuit, accused of violating U.S. securities laws by marketing and issuing unregistered and highly volatile meme coins, which exposed investors to significant financial risks, and collecting nearly $500 million in fees from this activity. The lawsuit has been submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, with the plaintiffs describing it as a “new evolution of a Ponzi scheme and pump-and-dump.”
Shortly after, two American law firms, Burwick Law and Wolf Popper, also sued Pump.fun, demanding the platform remove tokens that used its intellectual property, claiming those tokens utilized intellectual property (including its logo and name) without permission.
Worse still, as the MEME trend “cooled off,” Pump.fun, being the first victim of this wave of impact, saw both its graduation rate and trading volume plummet, further affecting the overall activity level within the Solana ecosystem.
Data from The Block shows that as of February 24, the graduation rate of Pump.fun tokens transferred to Raydium was only 0.96%, a drop of 54.7% from its historical peak of 2.12%. At the same time, Pump.fun’s on-chain transactions also significantly cooled, with average daily trading volume declining from a peak of $3.13 billion in January to $190 million as of February 24, a staggering drop of 93.9%. Furthermore, regarding protocol fee income, DefiLlama data indicates that as of February 25, Pump.fun’s protocol fee income stood at $2.45 million, a decline of nearly 84.1% from its historical peak of $15.38 million on January 25.
The substantial retreat in business forced Pump.fun to begin exploring more products. However, some of these initiatives undoubtedly posed a heavy blow to the Solana ecosystem, which has yet to recover. Earlier this month, crypto KOL Hebi (@hebi555) disclosed on X that Pump.fun intended to adopt a Dutch auction model for a public offering on multiple centralized exchanges (CEXs). Although Pump.fun co-founder Alon denied the rumor and stated that news about potential tokens was false, many industry insiders questioned this response. For instance, Wu Says Blockchain publicly accused Alon of lying, and multiple CEX-listed companies confirmed Pump.fun’s token issuance plan, indicating they could publicly share relevant preparatory documents upon receiving permission.
If Pump.fun ultimately issues tokens, it will undoubtedly have a massive impact on the Solana market, especially given the already tight liquidity, which is likely to lead to a greater outflow of capital. Moreover, Pump.fun has generated considerable revenue through trading fees, even ranking among the top 10 global companies in 2024 with an annual revenue of $1 billion.
According to Onchain Lens monitoring, Pump.fun has accumulated approximately 2.99 million SOL, currently valued at around $431 million, and its continuous cash-out behavior has exerted significant selling pressure on the SOL token.
More concerning is that Pump.fun has recently expressed intentions to “flip the table.” On February 24, market rumors suggested that Pump.fun was conducting internal tests for a self-developed AMM (Automated Market Maker) liquidity pool, with the community speculating that it might launch its own swap platform to replace third-party supplier Raydium in order to extract more transaction fees. This move has been widely perceived by the community as overly greedy.
If this news is confirmed, it would undoubtedly deliver a heavy blow to DEXs on Solana, as Raydium and Jupiter have carried a significant amount of liquidity from Pump.fun, and these DEXs serve as liquidity hubs for the Solana ecosystem. To make matters worse, platforms like Raydium and Jupiter have recently also been embroiled in the Libra insider token issuance scandal.
Following the emergence of this news, CoinGecko data indicates that since the announcement of Pump.fun’s AMM, the price of Raydium’s token RAY has already plummeted by 40.9%, although the overall market downturn has also contributed to this decline.
In response to the possibility that Pump.fun might completely abandon Raydium, Raydium’s core contributor InfraRAY commented that this would represent a “strategic misjudgment,” questioning whether Pump.fun could replicate its existing success. He further pointed out that if Pump.fun shifted to a new AMM, it could face multiple risks, such as insufficient infrastructure, low demand for token migration, and inadequate trading volume upon launch.
It is worth noting that the Solana Foundation invested in Raydium and Jupiter in October 2020 and March 2021, respectively. Pump.fun’s move to “go solo” undoubtedly touches upon the interests of the Solana Foundation, and this series of actions undeniably brings greater uncertainty to the Solana ecosystem.
“Those who disrupt the market to maximize profit extraction will reap the consequences. But those who create quality products, charge transparent fees, and compete for users are doing great. Their revenue should drive you to compete and capture their market share,” Toly’s latest tweet has also been interpreted by the community as a criticism of Pump.fun.
**With MEME Core Support, Time.fun Receives Strong Endorsement from Solana Official**
As one of the key drivers for Solana’s turnaround, MEME has become the new product officially supported by Solana after being backstabbed by Pump.fun.
Time.fun, another product originating from AllianceDAO, is a time tokenization platform similar to the previously popular Friend.tech, allowing creators to tokenize time and sell it as tradable tokens. Initially, this product was based on the Base network, but in November 2024, it announced plans to migrate to Solana. At that time, Time.fun co-founder 0xKawz stated,
“Over the past year, Solana has made significant advancements in many aspects. In contrast, the Ethereum ecosystem feels exhausted, often overly focused on technology and appearing arrogant. The atmosphere in Ethereum is akin to a group of aloof philosophers. If Ethereum does not address its cultural issues, as more developers like Time.fun choose to migrate, Solana will gradually dominate.”
On February 24 of this year, after officially migrating to the Solana network, Time.fun publicly promoted a MEME token called “Toly’s Minutes” on X. This tweet also received a reply from Toly himself, who stated that time is fun, and business communication is his favorite use case for cryptocurrency. This statement temporarily drove the market capitalization of the Toly token to soar.
Subsequently, Toly continued to post over ten tweets regarding Time.fun, clearly demonstrating his support. In addition to Toly, Solana co-founder Raj Gokal, and Helius CEO Mert Mumtaz from the Solana ecosystem have also participated in promoting Time.fun.
For Solana, Time.fun and Pump.fun share similar gameplay, both possessing a MEME core, and support for this product may continue this trend. Meanwhile, Time.fun has adopted a celebrity token issuance model with a verification mechanism, which reduces the common rug pull risks associated with previous celebrity MEME coins to some extent.
According to a report from The Block, Time.fun founder Kawz indicated that there are future considerations for issuing the platform’s own token. If other platforms are built on the basis of tokenizing time, a platform-based token could connect them all. However, Kawz also admitted that it is still too early to discuss a Time.fun token, as the platform must first find product-market fit, with the key goal being to make tokenized time composable for other platforms that can be built on Time.fun.
He noted that Time.fun’s true long-term goal is to create a new asset class that allows people to own, trade, and utilize others’ time for various products and services.
**Ecosystem Faces Setbacks, But Several Key Indicators Remain Strong**
Recently, the Solana ecosystem has faced numerous challenges, with persistent market FUD.
On one hand, after the MEME trend on Solana cooled, its market capitalization halved. CoinGecko data shows that as of February 26, the market capitalization of MEME on Solana is $8.64 billion, having peaked at nearly $15 billion in January.
At the same time, the impending unlock of a substantial amount of SOL has also brought liquidity pressure. A total of 11.2 million SOL will be unlocked for circulation on March 1, marking the largest token unlock in history (valued at $2 billion).
According to crypto analyst Artchick.eth, over the next three months, more than 15 million SOL (approximately $2.5 billion) will enter circulation, with most purchased by institutions such as Galaxy Digital, Pantera Capital, and Figure through FTX auctions at $64 per SOL, leaving several VCs with substantial profits.
Trader RunnerXBT pointed out that Galaxy Digital, Pantera, and Figure hold unrealized profits of $3 billion, $1 billion, and $150 million in SOL, respectively. The market speculates that these institutions may sell their holdings, and the recent endorsement of the MEME coin LIBRA by Argentine President Milei has intensified market panic.
Data also intuitively reflects the pressure facing the Solana ecosystem. Artemis data indicates that as of February 24, the number of daily active addresses on Solana was 5.3 million, a decrease of over 34.5% from this year’s peak; daily trading volume also significantly dropped from the annual high of $27.7 billion, down 62.1%, currently remaining at $10.5 billion.
Among these, the decline in DEX trading volume is particularly notable; although it still ranks second among all chains, it has decreased by 89.9% compared to the peak in January. Additionally, the price of the SOL token has dropped 46.2% from this year’s peak of $262.6.
These data reflect a clear decline in the activity and market heat of the Solana ecosystem. However, Solana still performs outstandingly in many key indicators. As of February 24, according to Artemis data, Solana ranks first with 5.3 million daily active addresses, surpassing Ethereum, NEAR, SUI, and Aptos.
In terms of transaction counts, Solana leads significantly with 56.5 million daily transactions, while other chains only manage millions or even fewer. Regarding Total Value Locked (TVL), Solana’s TVL reached $7.3 billion, second only to Ethereum, and surpassing Sui, Avalanche, and Aptos.
Moreover, Solana also has several potential upsides, such as expectations for SOL spot ETF applications and the opening of the Solana inflation model modification proposal SIMD-0228, which may inject more confidence and liquidity into Solana.