Howdy!

I’m excited to see some Lamine Yamal greatness in this Champions League semifinal. If there could ever be another Messi, Yamal may be it!

Today, we’ve got SVM L1s, LAYER price action, and the Solana Name Service token:

Here are the L1s built with Solana’s software

As Solana continues to cement itself as the most performant layer-1 blockchain by speed and cost, some crypto developers have gained an interest in using the technology underpinning Solana to launch new blockchains of their own.

To wit, there are around two dozen of these Solana Virtual Machine chains — counting layer-1s, layer-2s built on various other blockchains, and application-specific chains. But for simplicity’s sake, here are the layer-1s trying to out-Solana Solana:

Fogo

Fogo is a forthcoming layer-1 that says it wants to push the SVM’s performance to its limits by only running the Firedancer validator client on a permissioned validator set with multi-local consensus.

If that sounds like word salad, just know that Fogo’s bet is that with a fork of Jump’s open-source Firedancer code and a couple tradeoffs around decentralization, Solana’s software can be even more performant.

The layer-1 raised $8 million at a $100 million valuation via the crypto crowdfunding platform Echo.

Pythnet

The popular Solana oracle Pyth runs an SVM app chain where Pyth operators who provide price data run validators, and the protocol aggregates prices. 

Pythnet is the oldest on the list: Remarkably, Pyth shipped its SVM chain in August of 2022.

Since it’s a blockchain for data, this chain is less consumer-facing than others, but it’s an interesting decentralized way to stream price data — and the product has been live for nearly three years. 

Solayer

Solayer initially fundraised and launched as a Solana restaking protocol, but after Jito entered the restaking race — and as restaking became less buzzy, to put it bluntly — Solayer pivoted to launching its own layer-1 powered by its InfiniSVM.

Solayer’s documentation and leadership have claimed that it can achieve one million transactions per second at points, although some Solana developers dispute Solayer’s performance figures.

JupNet

The Solana DeFi giant Jupiter began teasing JupNet in January as an “omnichain network that aims to aggregate all of crypto in one single decentralized ledger.”

Little is yet known about JupNet, but Jupiter co-founder meow said in a blog post that its so-called Jupiter SVM has validators come to agreement on both internal Solana transactions and external transactions from other blockchains.

Jupiter has greatly expanded its business via acquisitions in recent months, but JupNet may be its most ambitious venture yet.

Cube

Cube Exchange is building an SVM L1, co-founder Bartosz Lipinski confirmed to me in a Telegram message.

Lipinski and co. forked the SVM as part of a product they’ve described as a hybrid centralized-decentralized exchange.

Thru

This one barely counts since Thru will be built on a new virtual machine called the ThruVM, but a lot of the intrigue around this brand new project comes from the fact that its co-founder, Liam Heeger, was previously a core engineer working on Solana’s Firedancer client.

So with the Firedancer credentials, Thru ekes out a spot on the list.

— Jack Kubinec

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Speaking of Solayer, take a look at this price chart:

Yesterday in this newsletter, we wrote about looming unlocks for LAYER in our “Alpha Dispatch” section. Hours later, the price dipped 45%. How’s that for alpha?

As is often the case when crypto tokens do funny things, some on social media blamed market maker shenanigans. I don’t have any alpha to share on that — but this is undeniably a strange chart.

— Jack Kubinec

Solana Name Service will soon launch a new token called $SNS.

The team will distribute 20% of its 10b supply to early SNS users via an initial airdrop, with another 40% reserved for upcoming campaigns and future community rewards. Of the remaining tokens, around a quarter will go toward ecosystem growth, 5% towards liquidity provision and 8.75% to core contributors, subject to long-term unlock schedules.

The token's stated purpose is to give .sol holders influence over SNS's direction, including the distribution of rewards, how features evolve and how onchain identity develops.

SNS started with big goals for decentralized identity on Solana, but internal pivots, shifting leadership and momentum stall-out left many wondering if the project would ever stick the landing.

Then, back in late 2023, a new team quietly took over following a prolonged period of inactivity and fragmentation. They shelved earlier ambitions, restructured the protocol and spent months auditing the user base for continuity.

Takeaway: Solana lacks a credible social identity layer, and SNS attempts to fill that role. If .sol domains become a proxy for history, reputation and coordination onchain, then $SNS may quietly transition from governance token to primitive social infrastructure.

— Jeffrey Albus

I sat down with the Jito Foundation’s new chief commercial officer Thomas Uhm for an interview. Uhm spent more than 20 years at the market making firm Jane Street, and this is his first crypto job. Fun fact: Uhm said he became aware of Jito through the founder poll we published in this newsletter. We get into institutional demand for Jito, Jito’s value capture and crypto’s market making woes.