Solana (SOL) is projected to outperform Ethereum (ETH), and ETH to outperform Bitcoin (BTC) in 2025, according to British multinational bank Standard Chartered, which predicts a fivefold increase in SOL’s price if Donald Trump wins the U.S. presidential election.
Introducing new valuation metrics for layer-1 blockchains, with a particular focus on Solana and Ethereum, Geoffrey Kendrick, Global Head of Digital Assets Research at Standard Chartered, also said he expects Bitcoin to hit $200,000 by the end of 2025, irrespective of who wins the election.
Solana is currently richly valued compared to Ethereum across all backward-looking metrics, according to Kendrick.
"Based on the market cap-to-fees ratio, SOL is valued at 250x, versus 121x for ETH," Kendrick said in a note to Decrypt. This high valuation implies market expectations of substantial growth for Solana, with projections of a 100-400x increase in throughput over the coming years.
Kendrick emphasizes the potential impact of the U.S. presidential election on these valuations, stating, "This rich valuation requires throughput on Solana to increase 100-400X (over the next several years), something that seems more reasonable under Trump than Harris (as a Trump administration will be more friendly to the overall digital asset ecosystem)."
In his analysis, Kendrick outlined different scenarios based on the outcome of the election, with, "SOL to outperform ETH and ETH to outperform BTC in 2025, with all boats rising at various (rapid) paces," in the event of a Trump victory. The report suggests that under a Trump presidency, by the end of 2025, SOL could see a 5x increase from current prices, ETH a 4x increase, and BTC a 3x increase.
However, the outlook changes under a Kamala Harris administration. "Under Harris, we would expect BTC to outperform ETH and ETH to outperform SOL in 2025," Kendrick predicted.
Providing specific price targets for Ethereum, Kendrick stated that Standard Chartered now sees Ethereum hitting levels of around $10,000 under Trump, and $7,000 under Harris.
<em>Edited by <a href="https://decrypt.co/author/stephen">Stephen Graves</a>.</em>