Solana-backed products drew in record investment of $50 million last week, thanks to the sol token's resilience during the altcoin crash

• Solana-backed investment products saw a record $49.4 million inflows in the week ending September 10, CoinShares said.
• There is now a total of $97 million invested in solana-backed products, according to CoinShares data.
• When the broader crypto market tanked last week, solana's sol bucked the trend, rallying to record highs.

Investors poured a record amount of cash into solana-backed products last week, encouraged by the sol token's steadfastness when the crypto market went into meltdown for two days, according to CoinShares' weekly flows report.

A record $49.4 million flowed into solana-backed products in the week to September 10, roughly the same amount that flowed into bitcoin-backed products in the month so far, the report released Monday showed. There is a total of $97 million in solana assets under management now.

Last week, after El Salvador made bitcoin legal tender, cryptocurrencies sold off quite heavily. Bitcoin itself lost 11% over Monday and Tuesday, while ether fell 13%. The smaller altcoins came under even more intense pressure - dot and dogecoin dropped around 20%, while cardano's ada gave up 21.4%. By contrast, solana's sol token gained around 25% in that time and hit an all-time high later in the week.

"During last week's price falls (sol's) price was a stalwart, outperforming a basket of the top 10 digital assets by 34%, having risen 24% week-on-week," digital asset management firm CoinShares said in its report.

Sol is the seventh-largest coin by market capitalization, at $49 billion. Bitcoin, the largest by market cap, is worth around $866 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.

"One thing that is anything but stifled despite surrounding market activity is solana. Sol has been the talk of our fringe finance town square these last couple weeks, and has shrugged off any negative news, sentiment, and broader market action entirely," crypto exchange Coinbase said in its newsletter Friday.

Solana is seen as a potential rival to ethereum, the largest blockchain for decentralized finance activity. It's faster and cheaper to use than its bigger competitor, according to CoinShares' investment strategist James Butterfill. Solana can handle 60,000 transactions per second at $0.0015 per transaction, while ethereum accommodates only around 17,000 at cost of $5.80 per transaction, he said last week.

CoinShares' data showed bitcoin products registered inflows of $200,000 in the week to September 20, while ether logged a second week of outflows, down $6.3 million.