The introduction of memecoins by President-elect Donald Trump and his wife, Melania, prior to the inauguration on January 20 caused significant issues for the Solana network. The launch of the Official Trump (TRUMP) and Official Melania (MELANIA) tokens on January 18 and 19 resulted in significant trade and network congestion.
Before January 19 at 9:43 PM UTC, there was no new activity for 30 minutes due to the overwhelming number of deals on Solana’s blockchain. This disruption brought up old concerns about Solana’s ability to handle large increases in trade volume. For the past 90 days, Solana has been completely operational. However, its history of outages, including a big one in February 2024, makes people doubt its dependability.
Investors are worried about how Memecoin will be distributed. The release of the TRUMP and MELANIA tokens garnered significant attention, yet investors remained skeptical. The main website for the MELANIA token stated that 35% would go to the development team, 20% to the treasury and community, 15% to the public sale, and 10% to liquidity. However, blockchain research showed that there were problems. Reports indicate that a single wallet held nearly 90% of the MELANIA token supply, deviating from the intended distribution.
Further investigation revealed that a company associated with Mrs. Trump owns the intellectual property that protects the MELANIA token’s website, raising concerns about transparency. The market value of the TRUMP token dropped by $5 billion in just 40 minutes after the MELANIA token went live, and its price fell from $74.60 to $45.90.
Solana and Memecoins’ Future The initial coin offerings of memecoins have sparked a larger discussion about the blockchain’s ability to grow and investors’ trust. Despite the trade frenzy demonstrating Solana’s ability to handle large-scale projects, concerns remain about the network’s resilience under high stress.
Politics and digital assets are becoming more and more connected as the cryptocurrency market grows. This creates both new possibilities and problems. To keep its spot as the best blockchain for decentralized apps, Solana will need to make sure it is reliable and deal with issues related to growth.
