Solana’s SOL token experienced a sharp rise after the launch of the meme coin linked to President-elect Donald Trump on the Solana blockchain network.
On Sunday, SOL climbed nearly 22% to above $291, according to CoinMarketCap, after briefly spiking over 34% in earlier days.
The surge in Solana’s price began late Friday, following the announcement of a new meme coin called “Official Trump” (TRUMP) on Trump’s social media platforms. Issued on Solana’s blockchain, TRUMP now boasts a market capitalization exceeding $14 billion, making it the largest meme coin on the network, according to data from CoinGecko.
This development comes ahead of Trump’s inauguration on Monday, an event anticipated to mark a transformative period for the cryptocurrency sector. It also coincides with the end of Gary Gensler’s tenure as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a figure often criticized by crypto advocates.
Several centralized crypto exchanges have begun listing the newly launched TRUMP token. Among the first to add TRUMP to their platform is ChangeNOW, a leading instant crypto exchange service renowned for its imminent support for the most promising tokens. The listing was revealed in a social media post on X and enabled users to swap and purchase TRUMP using fiat currencies.
Hold onto your toupees! @GetTrumpMemes is here, and it’s YUGE! 🇺🇸
Born in the wild world of memecoins, @realDonaldTrump’s $TRUMP is all about bold statements and bigger-than-life moves.
Ready to make crypto great again? Get $TRUMP NOW!
🔗 https://t.co/9MReQgMSV5 pic.twitter.com/v9ioSgah5x— ChangeNOW (@ChangeNOW_io) January 18, 2025
ChangeNOW features over 1,200 crypto assets, providing access to more than 500,000 exchange pairs. The platform supports fiat transactions in over 60 currencies and offers all popular payment methods such as Visa, Mastercard, and others. Transactions, including cross-chain swaps, are taking an average of five minutes to complete. Notable TRUMP exchange pairs on ChangeNOW are TRUMP/SOL, TRUMP/USDT, TRUMP/DOGE, TRUMP/PEPE, and more.
Aside from ChangeNOW, investors can buy the meme coin from Crypto.com, Bybit, MEXC, Bitget, HTX, and CoinW. The decentralized markets for TRUMP include Meteora, Raydium, and Orca.
2025 Is Shaping to Be a Big Year for Solana
As the fourth-largest cryptocurrency by market cap (excluding stablecoins), Solana has established itself as a high-speed, cost-effective alternative to Ethereum since its launch in 2020. It supports a variety of DeFi applications, gaming platforms, and popular meme coins such as Dogwifhat and Pudgy Penguins.
The rising popularity of SOL has drawn the attention of asset managers aiming to introduce exchange-traded funds (ETFs) based on its performance. ETF proposals from firms like Bitwise, VanEck, 21Shares, and Canary are under review, with a decision deadline approaching on January 25. ProShares also submitted filings for four SOL-based ETFs late Friday.
In 2024, SOL’s value surged by 88% and is now trading less than 1% below its all-time high, reached on November 22.
The Latest Trump-Linked Crypto Venture
The “Official Trump” coin was unveiled on January 17 on the president-elect’s X and Truth Social accounts, coinciding with the Crypto Ball, a Washington, D.C. event celebrating Trump’s return to the White House.
Trading began around 10:40 p.m. ET at an initial price of $6.54. Since then, the meme coin has skyrocketed nearly 1040% to $74, entering the top 20 list of cryptocurrencies by market cap, according to CoinGecko.
According to a disclaimer on the coin’s website, TRUMP is designed to symbolize support for the ideals associated with Trump’s brand and imagery. The site clarifies that it is not intended as an investment opportunity or security.
The coin’s initial supply is capped at 200 million tokens, set to grow to 1 billion over three years. Of the current supply, 10% is publicly available, another 10% is allocated for liquidity, and the remaining 80% is designated for creators and CIC Digital, a subsidiary of The Trump Organization.
This meme coin is the latest fundraising initiative from Trump’s team, which previously launched two NFT collections: Trump Digital Trading Cards on Polygon and Trump Bitcoin Digital Trading Cards on Bitcoin. The team also developed the decentralized finance platform World Liberty Financial, hosted on Ethereum.
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