Howdy!

I’m really interested by this “yaps” project that Kaito has sicced on Crypto Twitter. On one hand, incentivizing a bunch of random accounts to start reply-guying my posts has certainly helped my X growth. On the other, the app is going to become way less useful if all replies get clogged up by points farmers.

Today, we’ve got a Trump presidency’s implications for Solana, Binance LST flows, and a news roundup:

What’s to come for Solana under a Trump presidency?

Donald Trump begins his second term as President of the United States on Monday, and after an expensive campaign season, crypto will finally get its president. 

Bitcoin gained momentum following Trump’s victory, largely due to his pledge to create a strategic bitcoin reserve that would see the US Treasury Department accumulate nearly 5% of all bitcoin. But Trump taking office may still reap benefits for a less reserve asset and more use case focused network in Solana, industry participants say.

SOL is up 19% on the week leading up to Trump’s inauguration. The asset spiked 5% right after the New York Post reported the incoming president is “receptive to the idea” of a second strategic crypto reserve of tokens founded in the US like SOL, XRP, and USDC.

On that point, listen: I’m receptive to the idea of playing in the NBA, but that doesn’t mean you’ll see me suiting up for the Knicks this weekend. I think Paradigm’s vice president Alexander Grieve was prescient on the America-first crypto reserve.

“View such stories with skepticism until it comes from [Trump] or his staff,” Grieve wrote in an X post yesterday. “And question why such details might be in the press in [the] first place—[and] who might have put them there.”

There was other reporting on the Trump-crypto front that felt much more plausible this week however. Reuters reported that under President Trump, the Securities and Exchange Commission would “potentially freeze” crypto litigation that does not come with allegations of fraud. 

The SEC sued Coinbase and Binance in 2023, alleging that the crypto exchanges operated as unregistered broker-dealers for facilitating the trading of SOL, among other tokens. 

In defining SOL as a security, Gary Gensler’s SEC essentially said that US firms that exchange the token are breaking the law. This is because it has only given out two of its special purpose broker-dealer licenses, and neither of those recipients offer SOL. The SEC already dropped its Solana allegations from the Binance suit, but if the Coinbase enforcement were to also be frozen, then a potential major obstacle to the network’s adoption would be cleared.

With Solana’s unregistered security issues seemingly being put to bed, some are already looking ahead to SOL ETFs thaould see regulated Solana investment vehicles trade on public stock exchanges. Polymarket bettors give SOL ETFs a 75% chance of being approved in 2025, although Sol Strategies CEO Leah Wald said she doesn’t expect Solana ETFs to be approved “anytime soon” in a recent interview with Blockworks’ Katherine Ross.

There’s also arguably a more intangible benefit to come for Solana under a Trump presidency and friendlier regulatory regime. 

When SOL’s regulatory status was uncertain, developers largely focused on facilitating memecoin trading, which was “effectively a form of protest” against regulatory unclarity coming from the SEC, Titus Capilnean, vice president of go-to-market at Civic Technologies, said.

With Trump in office, crypto “may see a shift from pure speculation to utility-driven growth as builders gain confidence to launch more sophisticated applications without fear of regulatory backlash,” Capilnean said.

Many US Solana builders have told me over the last year that with regulatory clarity, their products would stand a much better chance of finding product-market fit. Here’s their chance to prove it.

— Jack Kubinec

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This June, developers, builders and innovators will come together in Brooklyn for Permissionless IV — a gathering to share ideas, collaborate and shape the onchain ecosystem.

Featuring a 36-hour hackathon, interactive workshops, and conversations with key voices in the space, Permissionless IV is all about forging connections and driving progress

📅 June 2025
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Be part of the conversations that matter.

Binance’s SOL liquid staking token is the fastest growing one by far:

The world’s largest crypto exchange announced an LST with Sanctum at the end of August. Since then, the product has unsurprisingly seen a lot of inflows, according to this chart from Kairos Research.

In just a few months, Binance’s bnSOL has already become the second-largest LST with over 20% market share. If you want to know why Solana’s liquid staking adoption has been up and to the right recently, then look no further.

— Jack Kubinec

ICYMI — Stories you may have missed from Solanaland this week:

• Phantom secured a $150 million funding round led by Sequoia and Paradigm, bringing its valuation to an impressive $3 billion. The influx of capital could fuel advancements in user experience and security, two critical factors as users migrate away from centralized exchanges like Coinbase in favor of self-custody wallets. With demand for self-sovereign solutions surging, it's this kind of strategic investment that projects like Phantom need to stay competitive in an increasingly crowded market.

• Helium has teamed up with DAWN to create the first decentralized last-mile internet solution. This means that Helium hotspot operators can now serve DAWN broadband users and vice versa, creating a decentralized way to provide internet access directly through user-owned infrastructure. This partnership immediately adds 8,000 DAWN nodes to the Helium Network, expanding its reach and potential.

• PumpdotFun is facing more legal troubles just days after its first birthday. Burwick Law and Wolf Popper LLP filed a federal class action lawsuit against the platform's creators, alleging exploitation and misconduct. The suit accuses the memecoin launchpad of using its platform to display offensive content and collect millions in fees from hopeful investors, including minors. This case could set new precedents for accountability in crypto platforms.

• Pulse announced the Series One, a wearable that combines AI insights and wallet integration with data incentives. Devices that reward healthy behavior are starting to get pretty buzzy. It's great to see projects encouraging users to actively engage in positive behaviors like personal wellness instead of falling for the often toxic cycles of speculation and utility-free hype (looking at you, memecoins).

• Franklin Templeton released a report on the rise of AI agents, with 7 of the 10 featured projects built on Solana. The report looks at how AI agents like Truth Terminal and ai16z are reshaping the crypto ecosystem. It's a trend that positions Solana as a leader in AI-driven blockchain innovation, with implications for content creation, decentralized finance, and beyond.

— Jeffrey Albus

A message from Michael Repetny, co-founder and CEO of Marinade: