Solana Draws BlackRock and Visa as Institutions Move In

Solana News

Solana (SOL) attracted growing participation from institutional finance and payment firms in Q1 2026, even as prices across the broader crypto market declined, according to a new report from Messari published May 18. The research firm said the nature of activity on the network is shifting away from speculative trading and toward infrastructure for tokenized finance and payments.

Solana’s real-world asset (RWA) market cap rose 43% quarter-over-quarter to $2.01 billion. The growth was led in part by the expansion of BlackRock and Securitize’s tokenized money market fund BUIDL on the network. BUIDL grew to $525.4 million on Solana after Anchorage Digital added custody support. Anchorage held roughly 81% of the asset’s supply on the network by the end of the quarter, Messari said.

Banks and Payment Firms Expand On-Chain

Several traditional financial firms also expanded their Solana-based activity during the quarter. Ondo Finance launched more than 200 tokenized stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) through Ondo Global Markets on Solana. Franklin Templeton partnered with Ondo to bring tokenized ETF products on-chain. Citigroup and PwC completed a proof-of-concept for tokenized trade finance built on Solana’s infrastructure.

Payments emerged as a separate area of growth. Messari said Visa, Stripe, Worldpay, Western Union, and PayPal each integrated Solana for stablecoin settlement or launched Solana-native payment products over the past year. The report cited the network’s low transaction fees and near-instant settlement as key factors drawing payment firms to the platform.

Stablecoin market cap on $SOL ended Q1 2026 at $14.85 billion, placing it third among all blockchains. Adjusted stablecoin transfer volume rose 13% quarter-over-quarter to $246.8 billion. Solana’s total application revenue, which Messari refers to as “Chain GDP,” held roughly flat at $342.2 million for the quarter.

Messari also flagged rising adoption of high-speed trading infrastructure on the network known as Prop AMMs. The firm said these systems are beginning to match or outperform centralized exchanges on execution quality and cost.

Solana’s forthcoming Alpenglow upgrade is expected to cut transaction finality from roughly 12.8 seconds to approximately 150 milliseconds. Messari said that performance gain could strengthen the network’s position in payments, tokenized finance, and AI-driven applications.

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