Howdy!

Franklin Templeton just threw its hat in the ring for a solana ETF. Fidelity and BlackRock are among the last major crypto ETF providers who have yet to file for SOL ETFs — I wonder if that will change soon.

Today, we’ve got Fogo Chain, trench vibes, and a news roundup:

Fogo plots a Solana chain running ‘pure Firedancer’

As Solana awaits promised upgrades to its performance stemming from the release of Jump’s Firedancer client, one group is already plotting to move Firedancer to its own blockchain.

Fogo Chain is a new layer-1 running on Solana’s software that will only use the Firedancer client and will implement multi-local consensus while making use of a curated validator set. Fogo’s creators think these features will help the chain — which is slated for mainnet and testnet launches in the first half of this year — push Solana’s software to its performance limits. The project is not without its detractors however.

Solana Labs developed the original Solana client. Jito forked this client and added MEV modifications that make transaction processing more lucrative. More than 90% of Solana’s stake runs on the Jito-Solana client. Chicago-based Jump, a high-frequency trading firm that has a crypto arm, was contracted by the Solana Foundation to build a high-performance Solana client from scratch. The so-called Firedancer client is still under development. A pared-down version called Frankendancer is fully live, but its lack of MEV opportunities means no one really uses it.

Fogo’s belief is that even when Firedancer goes fully live, Solana could be slowed down by validators who continue to run existing Solana clients.

“It would be like having a Ferrari but you drive it in bumper to bumper New York City traffic,” Fogo Chain co-founder Doug Colkitt said. He added that Fogo will make use of multi-local consensus, where validators can coordinate their physical locations to achieve lower latency than under Solana’s status quo, where randomly distributed validators need to reach consensus from across the world. 

Fogo’s validator set will also exclude “under-provisioned” or “abusive” validator nodes, according to its white paper.

Still, the fact that Fogo plans to use Firedancer’s open source code on a different blockchain has irked some. After Fogo Chain raised $8 million at a $100 million valuation via community fundraising platform Echo, a Solana developer wrote on X, “damn you can raise 8 on 100 just by redeploying some software that you don't understand? higher (IQs in vc please).”

Colkitt cast some of the Fogo flack as “fair” but insisted the new SVM chain is “accretive” to Solana because its experiments with pure Firedancer and multi-local consensus will gin up useful findings for Solana’s future development. Fogo will start out based on Frankendancer before transitioning to Firedancer. 

Fogo isn’t the only attempt to build a new blockchain using Solana’s software. Multiple Fogo contributors are affiliated with Douro Labs, the developer behind the Solana oracle network Pyth. Douro previously built Pythnet, an application-specific blockchain for Pyth that was built as a fork of Solana’s validator software.

— Jack Kubinec

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Mixed vibes are emanating from the trenches:

Following Javier Milei’s LIBRA mishap, pump.fun has seen six consecutive days with fewer than 40,000 token mints, the longest such stretch since November, according to Blockworks Research.

Memecoin interest is definitely down somewhat, but there is still an order of magnitude more Solana memecoin trading going on today than there was several months ago. The trenches are disappointed but not devastated.

— Jack Kubinec

ICYMI — Stories you might have missed from Solanaland this week

• Coinbase announced that SEC staff has agreed in principle to dismiss its enforcement case against the exchange, pending Commission approval, calling it a major victory for the industry and a correction of regulatory overreach. The case, which included claims that assets like SOL were securities, had been a focal point of the broader crypto-regulation battle in the United States. Coinbase argues that the SEC’s shifting stance on its business model — approved during its 2021 public listing but later challenged—  highlights the need for legislative clarity to prevent future regulatory weaponization.

• Crossmint introduced Solana Smart Wallets, a new(ish) generation of programmable, gasless wallets designed for mass adoption and built as smart contracts. They claim to eliminate private key management risks, require no tx prompts, and integrate with a wide variety of signers like passkeys and social logins. Fair warning for true believers in self-custody though: smart contract-based custody introduces an additional attack surface. The reliance on external infrastructure arguably erodes the core principle of sovereign ownership and increases dependence on third parties, ultimately shifting control away from the individual. Not that casual users are likely to care.

• GenesysGo's shdwDrive v1.0.10 is now live, enhancing its decentralized storage network with automated ticket management and improved gossip stability. Gossip stability refers to the efficiency and reliability of gossip-based communication protocols in decentralized networks. Traditionally, nodes exchange information randomly in a peer-to-peer fashion to maintain data consistency, but excessive redundancy and inefficient propagation can lead to network congestion, unnecessary resource consumption, and increased latency. GenesysGo’s update improves how nodes relay and confirm information, reducing redundant messaging while ensuring robust data distribution. Meanwhile, automated ticket management optimizes the handling of storage requests and resource allocation, reducing manual oversight.

• Jupiter & Meteora co-founder Meow addressed recent concerns regarding insider trading allegations, stating that no wrongdoing occurred and announcing an independent investigation led by Fenwick & West. Meow confirmed that Ben Chow, who led Meteora independently for over a year, has resigned due to lapses in judgment. While standing by Chow's character, Meow emphasized the need for higher project governance standards. Earlier this week, leaked conversations revealed Chow's prior involvement with Kelsier Ventures’ Hayden Davis, raising concerns about insider access to memecoin launches. Chow denied active participation in sniping but admitted to technical involvement in launches like $MELANIA.

— Jeffrey Albus

A message from Solana Legend, managing partner at Frictionless: