Over 1.3M tokens launched on Solana in January, sets new 12-month record

Solana tokens reached a 12-month peak in January, with a total of 1.3M new launches. Most of the expansion came from a new wave of memes. 

Solana tokens remained a staple of activity, with new launches picking up again in January. On peak days, over 63,000 new tokens were created, driven by the meme trenches. 

The rush to create more tokens happened despite the overall market slowdown. Token creation also boosted DEX trading, as well as fee generation for launchpads and exchanges. 

Despite the market slowdown and loss of trust in altcoins, Solana remains a venue of liquidity, allowing for short-term trading and significant expansion for some of the tokens. 

Small holders are the most relentless Solana traders

While the BTC and ETH market is dominated by whales and whale-sized orders, Solana attracts small holders. The current meme season is much less active in terms of trading volumes, mostly due to the fact that few tokens reach outsized valuations. 

Most of the newly launched and traded assets rarely pass a $30М valuation. There are also fewer attempts to create cults or long-term holder projects. 

January’s spike in activity was mostly driven by small-scale traders, with a moderate inflow of medium-sized wallets. Whales were the least influential cohort in the trenches. 

Over time, small holders also retained their levels of Solana token holdings, while medium and whale-sized traders divested their portfolios. 

More than 135K small-scale wallets hold Solana memes, while only around 35K medium-sized wallets retain a meme portfolio. Whales are even more rare, with only 2,066 large-scale wallets. Those holders may be teams or buyers from previous meme cycles. The overall valuation of Solana memes declined to $4.7B, boosted by legacy memes like TRUMP, BONK, and PENGU. 

Day-to-day activity, however, hinges on the latest hot token, with daily runners gaining over 100%. Those tokens may be short-lived or go through boom and bust cycles, but traders try to avoid the long-term decline from holding. 

Pump.fun activity picked up in January

Pump.fun continued to expand its activity, concluding a strong month in January. The app was back in the top 5 of fee producers, with $107.5M for January, the highest fee level since September 2025. 

Graduating tokens also rose in the past four weeks, to over 280 daily on average. Token graduations signaled more attempts to create longer-lived assets, rather than crashing the token during the initial launchpad trading stage.

Despite the higher activity, SOL remained weak. The asset dipped under $100 and continued to slide, recently retreating to $95.22. Briefly, SOL broke below $95 for the first time since February 2024.