Solana DEXs: Building Crucial Liquidity for Sustainable Crypto Growth

Solana DEXs have captured significant attention, dominating trading volumes across the cryptocurrency landscape. However, this impressive performance often relies heavily on highly speculative assets like memecoins. To achieve sustainable crypto growth and enduring market dominance, these decentralized exchanges must strategically pivot. They need to cultivate more resilient markets, especially by enhancing liquidity depth for foundational assets such as Bitcoin and stablecoins.

This perspective comes from Lynn Nguyen, CEO of Saros. It highlights a critical juncture for Solana’s decentralized finance ecosystem. While fast transactions and low costs have fueled its rise, long-term success demands a shift. Solana DEXs must move beyond short-term trends. They need to build a robust foundation for future market cycles.

Solana DEXs’ Ascent and Market Dynamics

Decentralized exchanges on Solana have consistently topped trading volume charts. They have often outperformed competitors on peer chains like Ethereum, Base, and BSC. Memecoins largely fueled this surge in volume. While these tokens demonstrate product-market fit in crypto, only a few have shown long-term viability across various market cycles.

OKX’s ‘The State of DEXs 2025’ report noted Solana’s rising prominence, stating, “Solana is drinking the Ethereum milkshake.” In late December 2024, Solana DEXs held nearly 90% of the total DEX market share. This represented an astonishing resurgence after the ecosystem’s perceived capitulation in the recent bear market. Dominance has fluctuated since then, but it has remained impressively strong.

Solana’s fast transaction speeds, minimal costs, and developer-friendly tools propelled its rapid expansion. It consistently led in transaction count and DEX active users. As the OKX report accurately stated, “Solana is truly the retail chain.” Market share stayed above 50% in January 2025. It surpassed Ethereum and Base on certain days. Matthew Sigel, head of research at asset management platform VanEck, observed, “Despite the MemeCoin Meltdown, Solana DEX volumes are still holding their own — roughly matching the entire ETH ecosystem.”

However, Ethereum-based DEXs eventually overtook Solana’s in August. This shift was driven by institutional interest and massive spot ETF inflows. The subsequent drop in trading volume for highly speculative assets led to a significant decline in overall DEX volume on Solana. By early September, volumes had plummeted 65% to $10 billion. Furthermore, the rise of “Prop” or “Dark” AMMs on Solana has compounded these reductions. These new models have steadily eaten away at the market share of conventional DEXs over the past year. This raises a crucial question: Should Solana DEXs prioritize more sustainable assets?

Overcoming Challenges: Speculation and Liquidity Depth

Solana DEXs face two significant hurdles to achieving sustained crypto growth. First, there is an overreliance on trading highly speculative assets. Second, there is a persistent issue related to liquidity depth. These most speculative assets are typically also the most volatile. This volatility causes massive spikes and crashes, not only in asset prices but also in trading volumes, particularly over longer time horizons.

For instance, trading volume on Pump.fun, a leading memecoin launchpad on Solana, plunged 63% in just one month. This led to a 90% decline in DEX volume, occurring amid what many considered a bull market. Moreover, extractive scams and substantial price drops, from LIBRA to TRUMP meme tokens, have occasionally damaged Solana’s reputation as a reliable trading ecosystem. These events highlight the risks associated with an over-reliance on speculative trading.

A deep dive published in OKX’s 2025 DEX report revealed concerning signs regarding liquidity depth on Solana. A comparative study across Ethereum, Solana, BSC, Arbitrum, and Base over 30 days showed Solana performed poorly. It scored low on key parameters like trading history, depth of liquidity, and sustained trading volume. Most Solana liquidity pools lacked sufficient total value locked (TVL). This suggests that despite recording high DEX trading volumes, Solana was doing so with considerably less liquidity than other blockchains. This situation can lead to negative price impact for traders, especially for larger orders. Optimizing for capital efficiency remains crucial. Liquidity depth is only beneficial if it is actively utilized. Aggregators must effectively route trades through multiple liquidity sources. DEXs must ensure sufficient depth to support larger transactions, preventing slippage and improving trader experience.

Boosting Resilience with Bitcoin DeFi

To attract more liquidity into Solana DEXs, they must fill their pools with resilient, large market-cap tokens. Bitcoin presents an ideal starting point. As the largest cryptocurrency, Bitcoin has proven its ability to withstand uncertain and volatile market conditions over its 17-year history. Bitcoin DeFi (BTCFi) is already a booming niche within the crypto industry. It leverages Bitcoin’s status as a $2.3 trillion asset class. Protocols and users are increasingly trying to utilize BTC as a productive asset through on-chain activity.

In fact, BTCFi VC funding reached $175 million in the first half of 2025 alone. This demonstrates significant investor confidence in the sector. Solana DEXs can seize this opportunity. They can build deep liquidity for the various BTC-wrapped assets that are emerging. Many of these wrapped assets already boast large individual market caps. Examples include wBTC, renBTC, and new protocols bridging Bitcoin to Solana. By embracing Bitcoin DeFi, Solana can tap into a massive, proven asset class. This diversification will reduce reliance on speculative tokens and foster a more stable trading environment.

Integrating Bitcoin liquidity offers several advantages:

• Enhanced Stability: Bitcoin’s lower volatility compared to memecoins provides a more predictable trading environment.
• Increased Trust: Leveraging the most recognized cryptocurrency can attract more institutional and retail capital.
• Broader Appeal: Expanding beyond Solana-native assets attracts a wider user base interested in Bitcoin-centric strategies.

This strategic focus can significantly improve the overall health and sustainability of Solana DEXs.

The Strategic Importance of Stablecoin Markets

Following the robust growth of Bitcoin DeFi, it is clear that stablecoin markets continue to strengthen. Stablecoins are arguably even more in demand during bear markets. Therefore, building deep liquidity for a variety of stablecoins simply makes strategic sense. This is particularly true for blockchains like Solana, which show a strong interest in maximizing stablecoin adoption on their chain. The evidence is clear. Solana hosted its first-ever stablecoin-focused conference, the Stable Future Summit, in Korea on September 23 of this year. This event underscores the platform’s commitment to fostering a vibrant stablecoin ecosystem.

Deep stablecoin liquidity provides numerous benefits for Solana DEXs:

• Reduced Volatility: Stablecoins offer a safe haven during market downturns, attracting users seeking to preserve capital.
• Improved Trading Efficiency: Deep stablecoin pools facilitate efficient swaps between different assets, minimizing slippage.
• Enhanced DeFi Utility: Stablecoins are fundamental for lending, borrowing, and other advanced DeFi strategies, expanding the utility of Solana DEXs.

By prioritizing a diverse range of stablecoins, including USDT, USDC, and potentially newer decentralized stablecoins, Solana can solidify its position. This approach will make it a more attractive platform for both retail and institutional users. These users value stability and reliable trading infrastructure.

Paving the Way for Enduring Crypto Growth

Prioritizing the industry’s strongest assets, such as Bitcoin and stablecoins, builds a stronger foundation for Solana DeFi. This strategic shift is crucial for achieving long-term crypto growth. It helps Solana move closer to its ambitious goal of underpinning internet capital markets. Furthermore, it ensures the ecosystem can stand firm during less favorable market conditions. The current dominance of Solana DEXs, while impressive, must evolve beyond speculative trading. It needs to embrace resilience and deep liquidity.

Ultimately, the future success of Solana DEXs depends on their ability to adapt. They must diversify their liquidity pools and focus on assets with proven staying power. This means actively developing robust markets for Bitcoin DeFi and strengthening stablecoin markets. By doing so, Solana can secure its position as a leading, sustainable, and reliable blockchain for decentralized finance, attracting a broader base of users and capital. This forward-thinking approach will transform its current dominance into enduring market leadership.

Opinion by: Lynn Nguyen, CEO of Saros. This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Crypto News Insights.