Benchmarking early Solana and Base: trading volume has matched, the stock on-chain rate is less than 0.05%, and the three major catalysts are still at the starting point.

Written by: Coulou

Translated by: Saoirse, Foresight News

You may have heard this saying: Timing the market beats time trading. I believe that the rise of Robinhood Chain and tokenized stocks is such a case. You cannot accurately predict every pullback and tedious sideways market, but you can judge that the trend has not yet exhausted and there is still upside potential, so you should maintain exposure until you see clear signs of overheating.

Recently, many charts have circulated showing that Robinhood Chain's fees have likely peaked, trading terminal transaction volumes have reached historical highs, and so on. I believe these indicators are not suitable for judging the trend direction.

In the previous cycle, such trading terminals did not exist; comparing them is like comparing DEX trading volumes in 2021 with those in 2017. The high fees on the Robinhood Chain are due to a sudden surge in activity causing network congestion. Now that fees have been lowered, transaction volumes and other core indicators are still continuing to rise.

Haseeb Qureshi, managing partner at Dragonfly, believes that the strategy of Robinhood Chain actively raising gas limits and reducing fees leading to a decline in chain revenue while maintaining strong DEX trading volume is oriented towards the long-term development of RWA and on-chain finance, rather than a mistake, although there is much controversy within the community about this business model.

In the following text, I will analyze the current position of Robinhood Chain through several data points. I want to emphasize again that timing the market will be more rewarding than timing trades.

Which stage of the cycle are we in?

We need to consider two cycles: the overall cryptocurrency macro cycle and the cycle of Robinhood Chain itself.

Looking at the macro cycle, the market is not far from its low point. Bitcoin has risen over 30% from its low point, and only two and a half months have passed since June's low of $58,000. It can be considered that the market is still in a large fluctuation range from the low point to $82,000.

Unlike the previous cycle, all indicators are significantly higher now. The bottom levels of on-chain supply and on-chain activity are even much higher than in October 2023 — at that time, Bitcoin had just broken through $30,000, 10 months after the bear market bottom, and its price had risen 75%.

• Global DEX trading volume is five times that of the last cycle's startup, equivalent to mid-2024 levels.
• The supply of stablecoins is 2.5 times that of October 2023 (when the Solana ecosystem began to explode).
• Tokenized stocks did not exist at all in the previous cycle.

This crypto cycle has only been active for 2.5 months, yet DEX trading volumes and the total locked value in DeFi have already reached levels seen in months 17-18 of the last cycle, with the scale of stablecoins far exceeding the historical peak of the last cycle, indicating a significantly stronger initial strength than the previous bull market.

Before this bull market officially started, DEX trading volume, DeFi locked amounts, and stablecoin size had all reached 2.3-5.1 times the levels at the start of the last bull market, and a new market segment of tokenized stocks has emerged that did not exist previously.

Additionally, applications like Fomo bring more mature infrastructure, and Robinhood’s huge brand traffic indicates that the current activity level on this public chain is already very close to that of Solana in the fourth quarter of 2023.

In just 11 weeks, Robinhood Chain (RH) has equaled or surpassed Solana’s performance in its 11th week of explosive growth in several core on-chain metrics, such as locked amounts, DEX daily trading volume, global DEX market share, and new stablecoin size, all while starting from a much lower base than that of Solana at the time.

On the other hand, the total market value of all assets on the chain remains far below that of Solana's ecosystem at the time. The asset structure has also changed: those performing the best on the Robinhood Chain are mostly cross-chain infrastructure tokens like Uniswap, Morpho, and Lighter, which have seen several times increases from the cycle's low point.

Robinhood Chain has directly introduced mature external infrastructure with almost no native infrastructure tokens; thus, on-chain capital speculation can only focus on local themes like Meme coins, AI, and PONS; whereas during Solana’s boom, capital speculated on both native infrastructure tokens and Meme coins.

However, the market value of Robinhood Chain's native assets is only a small portion of Solana's ecosystem BONK's peak size. (The chart scale does not reflect the true size; the Robinhood Chain section should actually be smaller than the other two sections).

The total market value of all 24 native tokens on Robinhood Chain is just $1.35 billion, which is only 64% of BONK's market cap at launch and 38% of BONK's historical peak, amounting to just 4.8% of the total scale of Meme segment during Solana's peak. The overall market cap base of native tokens is small.

Further observing the holding structure of native assets like AI and PONS reveals: although the total number of holding addresses and the number of high-net-worth wallets over one million dollars has reached levels prior to past billion-level token explosions, the proportion of medium-sized wallets (holding between $100,000 and $100,000) is very low, with the majority being small-holding wallets.

In the phase with a market cap of about $300 million, the density of big holder positions (Y-axis) is the dividing line for the success or failure of Meme coins. Successful coins have all densities above 14.4, while failing coins are below 14.4; RH's AI and PONS big holder densities meet the standard, but the breadth of retail holdings (X-axis) is insufficient, and whether it can fill the retail base is key going forward.

The density indicators for large holders of AI and PONS meet the standards, but the number of medium-sized holders (holding between $100,000 to $1 million) is significantly low, about 40% lower than the median for successful Meme coins, and there is a lack of a substantial retail user group to take over.

This missing group of medium-sized wallets could very well be the force driving the next stage of price increases for these assets. The holding structure mirrors, in many ways, the high proportion of small addresses seen before the surge in Virtuals, while also having a solid foundation of high-net-worth holders like WIF.

AI and PONS large holders account for levels seen among successful Meme coins, but there is a hollow structure: the proportion of small wallets is extremely high, and holders in the mid-range of $100 to $10,000 only account for about 10%, far below the historical bull coin range of 25-32%, lacking a core group of retail users.

This situation arises because this new ecosystem is still in its early stages, with limited capital inflow and insufficient effective liquidity available for layout on-chain. Trading terminals have brought in a large number of new users, who typically invest smaller amounts, while their numbers grow faster than high-net-worth users.

Additionally, Hood itself is not a crypto-native asset like SOL, and stock tokens have not yet been launched. There has been no wealth effect like that seen with SOL in 2023, where price increases led to prosperity across the chain. Solana's logic is: SOL price increases → on-chain activity increases. Meanwhile, Robinhood Chain relies on three major drivers:

1. Growth of the tokenized stock business (the core catalyst)
2. Guiding its existing users into the chain ecosystem
3. Attracting funds from other public chains, as well as non-chain preference funds from trading terminals. Currently, cross-chain fund diversions are evident, with Sol, Base, BSC, and various trading terminals competing for liquidity.

These three major drivers are all still in very early stages.

Catalyst One: Growth of Tokenized Stock Business

The total scale of tokenized stocks on the chain currently is less than 0.05% of Robinhood's stock asset on the books.

The current total scale of tokenized stocks on the Robinhood Chain is only $81 million, accounting for just 0.03% of the stock assets on the Robinhood platform, indicating there is still enormous room for growth in any future scenario.

To give an analogy, the current stage is akin to the stablecoin industry in 2019. The following two years saw explosive growth in total stablecoin supply, with year-on-year increases of 6.5 times and 6 times.

The current global scale of tokenized stocks is $2.55 billion, in the early stages of the stablecoin S growth curve, reaching the first $1 billion in just 0.7 years, which is far quicker than stablecoins; Robinhood Chain only accounts for 3.2% of the global tokenized stock market, and its own tokenization penetration rate of stock assets remains very low.

Robinhood Chain has been live for only 8 weeks, currently holding a 3.2% share of the tokenized stock market. Moreover, in the United States and Canada, there are still no tokenized stocks available, which leads to the second point.

Catalyst Two: Guiding Existing Users into the Chain Ecosystem

So far, Robinhood has almost not guided its existing user base into the public chain on a large scale. Although users from over 100 countries can use tokenized stocks, and the Robinhood Wallet has been released along with a partnership with Lighter to launch the LIT token incentive, everything is still just at the beginning:

• The public chain has only been born for two months
• The exchange has only launched the Cashcat native coin
• The market, which constitutes the majority of user and stock asset management, the US market, has not yet opened tokenized stocks.

Currently, Robinhood's stock tokens are only available to 3.5% of international users while US users cannot use them. The current $81 million tokenized stock scale is based only on a very small portion of user assets, and if the US regulatory exemption is implemented, there is massive release potential.

Overseas users comprise only 3.5% of Robinhood's total users, and Canadians still cannot use stock tokens.

The Solana-style wealth effect for Robinhood Chain has not yet arrived, as the doors have not fully opened. In the 18 months following the tariff incident in April 2025, the stock market added over $16 trillion in market value.

From the April 2025 tariff low to September 2026, the S&P 500 index rose approximately 52.93%, with the total market value of the US stock market increasing by $16.3 trillion, a rise of about 27.63%.

Robinhood Chain’s wealth effect may not simply come from within the chain; it may come more from the tokenization of various assets (existing categories as well as new categories like private equity), bringing new users with wealth onto the chain.

Looking back at historical cycles, the proportion of cryptocurrency business in Robinhood’s overall revenue tends to rise during bull markets, reaching peaks of 41% and 35% respectively. However, in the second quarter of this year, this proportion was only 7.6%. With its own public chain, tokenized stocks, and other tokenized projects, this cycle's revenue proportion from crypto business is expected to surpass 50% for the first time. There is still a lot of room to achieve this goal, whether in absolute scale or relative proportion.

This stacked bar chart shows the breakdown of Robinhood's quarterly net income: green represents cryptocurrency trading income, dark gray represents income from options, stocks, net interest, and other businesses; the proportion of crypto trading income fell from the 2021 peak of 41% to 7.6% in 2026, while the overall company revenue scale continues to expand.

This line chart shows the quarterly changes in the proportion of Robinhood's cryptocurrency revenue to total net income: in Q2 of 2021, the Dogecoin boom peaked at 41.2%, fell to a low of 4.9% in Q3 of 2023, rebounded to 35.3% in Q4 of 2024, and fell again to 7.6% in Q2 of 2026.

Don't forget that Robinhood has 27 million active users, who currently cannot use tokenized stock products in the official main app. Next, let's look at cross-chain funds and overall on-chain metrics.

Catalyst Three: Universal Funds from Other Public Chains and Trading Terminals

It’s hard to imagine, but the current data of Robinhood Chain remains:

• Bridging TVL ranking 10th
• Total DeFi locked amount ranking 10th
• Stablecoin market cap ranking 13th

This list shows that the Robinhood public chain ranks 10th in both bridging TVL and DeFi TVL and 13th in stablecoin market cap; the bridging TVL is $3.15 billion, DeFi TVL is $931.3 million, and the on-chain stablecoin market cap is $1.06 billion, placing it among mainstream public chains.

To evaluate how much incremental capital Robinhood Chain can obtain from the outside, several key points must be considered:

• This cycle's cross-chain features are increasingly significant, with Solana, Robinhood Chain, and BSC jointly dividing the market, and Fomo providing a unified cross-chain interaction experience with growing influence.

This is a stacked bar chart of weekly trading volumes of multiple public chains compiled by Dune, showing that in mid-2026, Robinhood Chain (yellow) saw explosive growth in trading volume, driving overall on-chain trading volume and total fees (white line) to rise sharply, forming a distinct FOMO market.

• However, looking at transaction volume proportions, Robinhood Chain has already secured a substantial share. On-chain activity tends to lead locked amounts and other indicators. Nearly half of the trading volume on the Fomo platform flows to Robinhood Chain, but the chain's TVL is only one-sixth that of Base.

This 100% stacked area chart shows the changes in daily trading volume proportions among public chains; since the beginning of July, Robinhood Chain (bright yellow) has rapidly expanded its share, squeezing the volume share of other chains like Solana, BNB, and Base, becoming the public chain with the highest trading volume share during the market’s FOMO phase.

• Robinhood Chain has a unique advantage in attracting some Ethereum ecosystem funds that would rarely cross chains before. DeFi and veteran Ethereum players are gradually entering the market. With tokenized stocks and stablecoins bringing more liquidity and assets, more assets will bridge over from Ethereum.

This bar chart compares the DeFi locked TVL of Robinhood Chain with that of mature public chains: Robinhood Chain's TVL is $931 million; Ethereum's is $50.3 billion, which is 54 times larger, Solana’s $5.91 billion is 6.4 times larger, and Base’s $5.65 billion is 6.1 times larger, indicating that while its trading volume is booming, the DeFi locked scale is still far below that of leading public chains.

• Capital circulation in the crypto market takes time. In some sense, the current Robinhood Chain resembles the early stage of HYPE right after its token issuance. At the time, HYPE ranked around 70th in market cap, but the market widely expected it to quickly break into the top 20. The capital allocation at that time was highly biased towards SOL, without fully accounting for HYPE's fundamentals. Subsequently, a huge amount of money flowed in, leading to a tenfold increase in token valuation within months and a thirtyfold increase over several years.

This is the net capital inflow bar chart of Robinhood Chain from DefiLlama, with significant surges in net inflows seen in July-August 2026, showing nearly $500 million in large single-day inflows, alongside intense large net outflows, causing notable fluctuations in capital movements.

• In the 2023-2025 cycle, both Solana and Base achieved explosive growth by attracting external on-chain funds. Robinhood Chain is likely at the starting point of this growth curve.

This chart shows the growth of Solana and Base during the 2023-2025 cycle, with their TVLs increasing 29 times and 11 times, respectively, in 18 months, and the highest DEX trading volumes expanding 105 times and 66 times, with stablecoin scales also soaring dramatically, perfectly illustrating the explosive path of a public chain bull market.

The essence of the crypto market is to chase capital flows, betting on where new buyers will emerge.

In recent years, many profitable trades have fundamentally involved betting on the gap between future capital flows and current valuations:

• ZEC was repriced as a privacy alternative to Bitcoin
• HYPE competed in trading volume and open interest with centralized exchanges, creating a new market for around-the-clock stock trading
• LIT became the core platform for Robinhood derivatives, benefiting from a regulatory narrative advantage due to domestic architecture
• VVV represents the narrative for private inference tracks
• UNI was once seen as a declining exchange but sustained substantial trading flow from Robinhood Chain and tokenized stocks

Combining the three major narratives of tokenized stock growth, user migration, and cross-chain capital inflows, the coming opportunities lie within the future growth expectations of Robinhood Chain and the significant valuation gap of core assets like AI and PONS.

Looking Back to Take a Holistic View

We cannot determine where the cryptocurrency market will go in the coming months. Will regulations become clearer? Will the Federal Reserve raise interest rates? What impacts will midterm elections bring? Market participants often get caught up in short-term news while neglecting the larger cycles of long-term capital flows. A few points deserve consideration:

• Bitcoin is still down 40% from its historical peak.
• The S&P 500 has more than doubled since 2022, with a 50% increase since the tariff low in April 2025, reaching a total market value of $70 trillion; gold has doubled since 2022, almost doubling again by early 2024-2025, reaching a total market value of $32 trillion. Since 2022, over $55 trillion has been added to wealth, with an additional $35 trillion from early 2025 to now, leaving massive wealth in the hands of investors.
• Institutional and corporate participation, the regulatory discussion environment, on-chain and off-chain technologies, product experiences, and levels of popularization have all reached unprecedented levels, while Robinhood happens to be at the intersection of all this.
• Robinhood has been continuously investing in tokenization for many years. Given the immense commercial interests involved, it is almost impossible for them to abandon this business line.
• Currently, less than 3% of its self-owned users have accessed tokenized stocks, and the stock asset on-chain ratio is less than 0.05%.
• The officials have just announced that tokenized stocks will include voting rights. Those in the traditional crypto space are well aware that this is a strong benefit for Meme stocks. Similar stories unfolded in the previous two cycles, and this time it lands in real entities. Compared to versions without voting rights, this completely rewrites the value for token stockholders.
• Tokenized stocks are only the first phase. Subsequent plans also include real assets like private companies, real estate, and art.

We tend to overestimate what can be accomplished in the short term while underestimating the power of prolonged time frames. When direction is uncertain, it's wise to think along the lines of profit motives.

If you believe that this trillion-dollar market cap company’s long-planned tokenization strategy is merely short-term speculation lasting two months, you might be overlooking some key information. Meanwhile, I have already made my bets.