This article was originally published on Fool.com. All figures quoted in US dollars unless otherwise stated.
What happened
The world of cryptocurrencies was on fire this morning, and Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) was leading the way. Solana jumped as much as 17.5% in trading over the last 24 hours and as of 11:30 a.m. ET is up 15.1% on the day.
So what
The biggest news to hit Solana in the last day is word of a $150 million gaming fund from Forte, Griffin Gaming Partners, and Solana Ventures. As the companies backing cryptocurrencies aim to build utility, using games has become a popular growth strategy, and this is a very large fund to build games for Solana. This follows a $100 million fund by Solana Ventures, FTX, and Lightspeed Venture Partners in November to invest in play-to-earn games.
Another big announcement came from former first lady Melania Trump, who is launching an NFT on Solana. People can buy a Trump NFT for 1 SOL or $187 on a credit card through MoonPay, and funds will support the Be Best initiative. In a statement, Trump said she hopes to release more tokens in 2022.
Now what
The theme here is that Solana is becoming a go-to cryptocurrency for utility projects and low-cost NFT sales. Selling a sub-$200 NFT on a blockchain like Ethereum is too expensive, and it's a race to build lower-cost alternatives. Solana appears to be winning that race against other cryptocurrencies, which is why its value is up sharply today.
This article was originally published on Fool.com. All figures quoted in US dollars unless otherwise stated.
