The Year of the Alts

BNB, the native token of Binance Smart Chain, went from $5 billion to $85 billion, Solana’s SOL exploded from $85 million to $55 billion, and Cardano’s ADA took off from $5.5 billion to $46 billion (though it was at $95 billion over the summer). To be sure, a dramatic rise was to be found in layer 2 protocols, too. Polygon, a supplemental network to Ethereum, saw its native token MATIC rise in value from just $91 million at the start of 2021 to $18 billion at year end.