Solana (SOL) Soars to All-Time High of $294, Straining Coinbase's Infrastructure

At one point on Sunday, Solana (SOL) soared to an all-time high of $294, fueled by a surprise meme coin launch from President Donald Trump

Solana (SOL) price hit a record high of $294 on Sunday, following the launch of meme coins by former President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump.

The surge in trading activity put a strain on Coinbase’s infrastructure, prompting the exchange to apologize and promise faster, more robust service in the future.

Solana’s troubles began shortly after President Trump launched his official memecoin on the Solana blockchain last Friday.

This move, intended to raise funds for charity, quickly attracted a large number of users seeking to trade and purchase the new token.

According to DeFiLlama, the influx of activity drove Solana’s trading volume to over $36 billion.

As buyers rushed to acquire the Trump memecoin, some liquidated other cryptocurrencies to free up capital.

This surge in activity caused Coinbase’s systems to buckle, leading to delays and cancellations of Solana transactions.

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong took to X to confirm the issue and apologize for the inconvenience.

However, he also framed the problem as a “high quality” issue, arguing that the high demand signaled Solana’s growing appeal.

Armstrong acknowledged the need for Coinbase to “step up our game on Solana, scale our infrastructure, and provide native support for common use cases like DEX/memecoin trading.”

In a separate statement on X, Andrew Allen, a protocol specialist at Coinbase, echoed Armstrong’s stance.

“It’s on us to improve. Not Solana’s fault. Solana usage has pushed our infra past its limits,” wrote Allen.

Despite the blockchain itself not fully crashing, the exchange delays were significant, causing transaction backlogs of up to 21 hours.

According to Armstrong, the difficulties were "triaged," and anyone experiencing canceled transactions was encouraged to retry them.

However, this was not Coinbase’s first encounter with technical difficulties during periods of high trading volume.

Last February, a wave of Bitcoin exchange-traded funds similarly overwhelmed the platform, leaving some users locked out during critical buying and selling windows.

Critics took to social media to question why Coinbase continues to face these challenges, especially given the exchange’s size and experience.

Meanwhile, Ryan Rasmussen, head of research at Bitwise, noted that the rush into Trump’s memecoin caused investors to rotate funds rapidly, “leading to an explosion of on-chain activity.”

This brisk pace of trading once again highlighted concerns that Solana’s ecosystem, while expanding, may still be on shaky ground when faced with such extreme and unprecedented demand.

Amid Rising Competition, Price Volatility Continues

Despite — or perhaps because of — its performance woes, Solana’s price briefly soared to $294 on Sunday.

Major drivers included the Trump-themed memecoin craze, along with the introduction of another token launched by the first lady.

Trading enthusiasts piled onto the Solana blockchain at record levels, setting off considerable hype and speculation that Solana might sustain its upward momentum.

However, new players in the crypto space are seizing the opportunity to position themselves as stable alternatives.

Platforms such as DTX Exchange are touting hybrid models and scaling capabilities, aiming to accommodate large volumes without service interruptions.

While Solana has claimed a top-five ranking by market capitalization, analysts warn that repeated outages and exchange slowdowns risk undermining investor confidence.

If such events persist, there are concerns that users could gravitate to emerging platforms offering faster speeds and fewer reliability issues.

Armstrong has promised that Coinbase will prioritize Solana going forward, aiming to bolster the exchange’s capacity to handle extreme swings in traffic.

Whether these assurances will be enough to quell user skepticism remains to be seen.

For now, Solana’s rapid ascent — and the turbulence that accompanied it — underscores both the promise and the perils of a market still learning how to manage blockbuster demand.

As crypto continues to grow, infrastructure upgrades will be crucial to sustaining widespread adoption, with eyes trained on Solana and Coinbase to see if they can stay ahead of the next wave.