The number of traders in the Solana ecosystem is rapidly declining. According to data from the analytics platform Dune, the number of decentralized exchange (DEX) users fell from 4.8 million in January to just 900,000 in August 2025. At the same time, transaction volumes also dropped—from 45 million in June to fewer than 30 million by the end of August.
Reasons for the Decline
Analysts link the downturn to the growing number of scams in the meme coin sector. Ryan Li, Chief Analyst at Bitget, noted that “Solana is overly dependent on the volatile activity of meme coins, and this could undermine the ecosystem’s sustainable growth.”
The situation has been worsened by high-profile hacks of celebrity accounts. In August, attackers gained access to the Instagram profiles of Adele, Tyla, and members of Michael Jackson’s family, using them to promote fraudulent Solana-based tokens.
A similar case occurred with the CR7 token, allegedly linked to Cristiano Ronaldo: within minutes of its promotion, the asset’s market cap skyrocketed to $143 million, only for insiders to drain all liquidity. On August 27, hackers also hijacked Kanye West’s account to promote a fake YZY meme coin, which caused his official token to plummet by more than 80%.
Competition from Other Blockchains
Another factor behind Solana’s decline is growing competition. While Solana accounted for 76% of DEX trading volume at the start of the year, its share fell to just 26% by the end of August. Institutional investors remain interested in the network, but the number of retail traders is steadily decreasing.
“Without moving beyond meme coins, Solana will struggle to compete with Ethereum’s more robust DeFi ecosystem,” Ryan Li emphasized.
Pump.fun Surges Amid the Downturn
Amid the overall slowdown on Solana, the Pump.fun platform—which specializes in meme coin generation—continues to grow. Over the past 24 hours, its trading volume exceeded $210 million, giving it an 86% market share.
Since launch, Pump.fun has generated more than $800 million in cumulative revenue. In the past two weeks, the project has repurchased $15 million worth of PUMP tokens, while its price has surged 38.4% in a month, reaching $0.003 at the time of writing.
