Buy Solana (SOL)

Yes, you can buy SOL with PayPal at Anycoin Direct. You can also pay by VISA, MasterCard, SEPA, Sofort and EPS bank transfer.

The PayPal platform is simple and fast. It is very easy to carry out transactions with just a few clicks. If you want to buy SOL with PayPal, you don't have to enter your bank details every time. Therefore, money transfers with PayPal are completed within a few moments. Furthermore, PayPal has been around for 25 years and is one of the largest payment methods in the world. Anycoin Direct allows you to buy SOL with PayPal.

No. It is not possible to deposit SOL directly into your personal PayPal wallet. 

Yes, when you buy SOL, you can choose to send them to your own wallet. Alternatively, you can choose to have your coins managed by us; we will then store your SOL securely in the Anycoin Vault.

Yes, buying Solana is safe with Anycoin Direct because we have advanced security techniques and are officially licensed by BaFin. Buy SOL safely with us with a wide range of payment options.

No, as with Bitcoin, you can buy part of a Solana. This means you don't have to buy a whole Solana, but can opt for 0.1 Solana, for example. With Anycoin Direct you can trade from as little as €10.

The story of Solana began in 2017, when Anatoly Yakovenko, then working at Qualcomm, was studying Bitcoin and its hash function at Solana Beach in California. There he had a groundbreaking idea: Bitcoin's hash function, SHA-256, could be used to create a decentralised clock on a blockchain. Anatoly christened this concept "Proof of History".

First of all: Solana is very complex and Proof of History is not a consensus mechanism per se but rather a part of the Proof of Stake mechanism that Solana uses.

With Proof-of-History (PoH), transactions are time-stamped when they are added to the Solana blockchain. Cryptography is also used for the clock, which was the basic idea of the inventor.

A new block is created on the Solana blockchain every 400 ms (compared to Ethereum about every 30 seconds and Bitcoin about every 10 minutes).

However, instead of "solving" the hash functions to create a new block, Solana instead uses the repetitive outputs of SHA256 as a reference timestamp. This results in a kind of "clocking", where each bar is 400ms (instead of one second like a normal clock).

DPoS? No!

Next, let's clear up a few misconceptions about Solana. Many sources refer to the Solana Consensus as the Delegated Proof of Stake DPoS. This is incorrect, and the Solana team has stated this several times. This mistake is easy to make as there are different roles on the Solana blockchain (leaders, validators, archivers, etc.).

While DPoS cryptocurrencies essentially delegate these roles to network participants, Solana does not. Simply put, all nodes on Solana play a role in fulfilling all network roles.

For example, the leaders on Solana have the task of producing new blocks. The leaders change every 4 blocks (1.6 seconds). While a node occupies a leader position, it packs as many transactions as possible into the four blocks it produces and shows these blocks with the transactions to the corresponding groups of nodes, the so-called Solana clusters. These nodes validate the transactions using digital time stamps as a reference and then quickly forward the data records to other relevant nodes in the network.

Unlike other PoS cryptocurrencies, there is no minimum stake required to be a node on the Solana blockchain. Ethereum "node" operators, for example, need to stake 32 ETH, which is a significant amount of money. Of course, the amount of block rewards you receive is proportional to the amount of SOL tokens you have staked on the network. Whilst the selection of leaders is pseudo-random*, the amount of SOL you stake also affects the likelihood of you becoming a leader that actually produces blocks. Incorrectly acting nodes will have their stakes reduced and the reduced funds will be added to the rewards for block production.

Although there are still a number of Solana core functions worth mentioning, we will limit ourselves to the most important ones. In addition to the Proof of History (PoH) we have just explained, we will also discuss Sealevel and Gulf-Stream.

*pseudo-random: (a number, a sequence of numbers or any digital data) that satisfies one or more statistical tests for randomness but is generated by a specific mathematical procedure.

Solana's Sealevel technology was the first in the world to enable the processing of multiple smart contracts in parallel on a blockchain, which means that the chain is more effective at processing simultaneous transactions.

Gulf Stream makes it possible to know a small number of future leaders so that they can start accumulating transactions before they start producing blocks.

Here is a small example:

Imagine a small company with 180 employees. Although there are different departments in this company (e.g. accounting, shipping and receiving, customer service), each employee knows how to do the work of every other department. In addition, each employee is pseudo-randomly selected to be the boss (leader) for 1.6 hours at a time, who has to sign the incoming documents from the different departments.

Although the selection of the boss is partly random, each employee has a small window on their computer screen that shows them the next 10 people who will temporarily take on the role of boss. In this way, they can hand over their documents to this employee before he or she becomes the boss, so that he or she can already work ahead (Gulf Stream).

Every time the boss signs something, it is time-stamped and sent back to the relevant department (Solana "node clusters"), where it is double-checked and, if approved, added to the company database. Each department can do its own paperwork at the same time as there is no overlap (Sealevel).

Every employee plays some role in storing those records, reviewing those records and making sure the boss is really doing his job and not slacking off. That's basically how it works at Solana.

Solana Firedancer is a high performance validator client for the Solana blockchain created by Jump Crypto and the Solana Foundation. Its goal is to improve the efficiency, speed and resilience of the network.

The whole thing has been running on the testnet since the end of 2023 and is to be introduced on the mainnet in the course of 2024.

The current Solana nodes reach their limits when processing transactions simultaneously, which limits the number of transactions that can be processed at the same time and can lead to data congestion. In addition, the client does not yet provide support for sharding, a technique that is essential for horizontal scalability, which hinders efficient expansion of the growing network. This challenge comes to light when the blockchain is once again confronted with increasing transaction volumes.

This is where Firedancer, a planned independent validator client for Solana, comes into play. In a demo in November 2022, it processed 1.2 million transactions per second, showing significant improvements. Firedancer is expected to bring redundancy, efficiency and possibly even lower the cost of running nodes. In addition, Firedancer:

• Sharding: This involves dividing the entire network into several smaller parts

• Improved consensus protocol: Firedancer uses a modified version of the Solana consensus protocol, a proof-of-stake (PoS) system that makes the consensus process more efficient and reliable.

• Increased resilience of the Solana network. Back in 2022, there were concerns about the centralisation of Solana's validator client. There was only one validator client, operated by Solana Labs, which was responsible for distributing updates and understanding the protocol.

Although Firedancer is still in its infancy, performance tests show that Solana could have what it takes to outperform transactions per second (TPS) of Visa or any other blockchain. Perhaps one of the most impressive aspects of Solana's scalability is Firedancer's potential to exponentially increase Solana's performance on the mainnet. There is no need for a new scaling solution every few years and sidechains. The result is a unified Solana network, unlike the fragmented network of Ethereum, which has multiple layer 2 and sidechains.

The Solana Phone, announced in January 2024, represents a significant step towards the integration of blockchain technology into standard mobile phones. It will run on Android and serve people who feel at home in the cryptosphere.

What makes the whole thing so special is the seed vault, a separate memory that stores private keys and seed phrases separately from the application layer, just like a blockchain layer. Of course, it is also compatible with other blockchains.

The technical data sheet states, among other things, that the mobile phone is in the upper class. With plenty of memory and RAM.

The smart contract functionality of Solana comes with many different decentralised exchanges (DEX). The best known DEXes on Solana are:

• Jupiter

• Raydium

• Orca

• Kamino Finance

There are dozens more of them, each with different functions. The smart contracts on the Solana blockchain are also updateable, which means that the old version cannot be overwritten with every update instead of rewriting it from scratch, as is the case with the competition (Ethereum).

Some of the memecoins that were launched exclusively on Solana are:

• Bonk (BONK)

• Samoyedcoin (SAMO)

• Dogwifhat (WIF)

• Myro (MYRO)

• Popcat (POPCAT)

At this point, it should be said that the transaction costs and speeds are better than Ethereum. However, this does not only bring advantages! With the blessing also comes a curse.

There are countless scam coins on all blockchains, but the popularity of those blockchains is usually limited. There are many new projects that are thrown onto the market quickly and cheaply, move north in one or two (rarely more) waves, attract a lot of attention and capital, only to fall completely to 0 due to the distribution (tokenomics) and the associated purchasing power of the owners!

Of course, this also exists on Ethereum, the most popular memecoin blockchain, but the costs are higher, which means that the scammers have to raise a certain amount of start-up capital.

Solana has built relationships with some small, unknown start-ups such as Google, Visa and Amazon.

Partnerships with technology giants are often seen as an important milestone for a blockchain project, as they not only underpin the legitimacy of the project, but also demonstrate practical implementation, use cases and progress.

Meanwhile, Solana nodes can be easily run on Amazon's AWS via the Node Runner app for Solana. Solana nodes can be set up with very little effort, and the AWS Activate Programme is now available with Solana Ventures to incentivise start-ups to build on Solana.

Google BigQuery has also been integrated into Solana for data analyses. This simplifies access to Solana-based data and provides more comprehensive insights into Solana's blockchain analyses. Google also operates a block-producing Solana validator on Google Cloud.

The credit card giant Visa has tapped into Solana and introduced the settlement of the USDC stablecoin via the Solana network. This allows partners to use the Solana blockchain to send or receive settlements in USDC. This partnership is not just for show, as Visa stated in live pilots where millions of USDC have already been moved between partners across the Solana and Ethereum networks to settle authorised payments in fiat currency via VisaNet.

Proof of History should produce a blockchain that is faster, cheaper and more scalable than Bitcoin. Solana was conceived as "the new blockchain". Anatoly started programming in C, but soon switched to Rust for efficiency reasons. Greg Fitzgerald, a former colleague at Qualcomm, joined the project and implemented Anatoly's prototype whitepaper in Rust. The project was initially known as "Loom", but they later changed the name to "Solana" - named after the beach where the three of them often surfed together.

In 2018 and 2019, it was possible to buy Solana in advance and the company raised 20 million dollars in a series of private token sales. In early 2020, their public testnet "Tour de SOL" was launched, followed by the launch of their beta mainnet in March 2020, marking the beginning of Solana's rise as a promising blockchain technology.

Investors who buy Solana are often also active in the DeFi/GameFi world, a fusion of decentralised finance and gaming. The idea behind this is that new games with financial elements can find a place in the Solana network.

Solana GameFi supports game development studios and technology companies in the gaming industry. Virtual reality also plays an important role in this, as it offers an enhanced and immersive gaming experience. Solana enables the development of various dApps and GameFi applications.

There are a large number of partners, dApps and participants in the Solana ecosystem. We would like to briefly mention some of them here:

• DeFi: DeFi platforms include Orca, Raydium and the Hubble protocol.

• Lending: Platforms such as Solend, Francium and Port Finance enable loans to be granted.

• NFT: Platforms such as Solsea, Magic Eden and Exchangeart are relevant for trading non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

• Web3.0: Here you will find projects such as Audius, Panzer Dogs and Phantasia, which represent the next generation of the Internet.

• DEX: The decentralised exchanges (DEX) include Solend, Lumos Exchange, Hydraswap and 01.

• Metaverse: Space Falcon, Star Atlas and Afflantium Metaverse are active in the metaverse.

• dApps: The decentralised applications (dApps) include Tatum, StarLaunch and Kin.

Solana also works with well-known platforms such as Binance, Kraken, PancakeSwap, UniSwap as well as CoinGecko, Brave Browser and many others, the list of which is too long to include here.

The Solana Foundation, based in Zug, Switzerland, oversees the entire project and ensures that Solana maintains a positive reputation and that new, innovative developments are integrated into the roadmap. It is committed to ensuring that the network remains decentralised and supports new validators at launch. Projects wishing to be developed on the Solana blockchain can contact this foundation at any time for financial support.

CO-2 Footprint

One of the Solana Foundation's main tasks is to keep an eye on the energy-neutral operation of Solana. Although Solana already has very low energy consumption, the foundation strives to minimise this even further and offset any remaining emissions.

To this end, the foundation publishes open data from an energy consumption report so that everyone can see how they can contribute to reducing their environmental impact. It also encourages validators operating heavy equipment to take action to reduce their environmental footprint. People with innovative ideas on how to make Solana or their own practice more energy efficient can apply for funding for their projects or ideas.

The NFTs are also designed to encourage people to spend more time outdoors - so Solana is also promoting health! The Solana Foundation has set itself the goal of achieving a zero carbon footprint. You can check the current status in terms of environmental impact on their website. Currently, the aim is to achieve at least a zero CO2 footprint.

Around 420 million tokens are currently available on the market. Another 140 million are expected to be added over the next 10 years. The strategy is to keep coin minting relatively low and gradually flatten the curve to ensure that the Solana price remains stable.

Would you like to buy Solana yourself, but still have questions? Don't hesitate to contact our customer service. We will be happy to help you.

Solana has established itself as a promising option in the crypto world. Buying Solana on Anycoin Direct offers the chance to invest in a digital currency that is known for its fast transactions and low fees. Solana's native token, the SOL token, has shown an impressive performance and is therefore attracting many investors.

The SOL token price is volatile, as with many other cryptocurrencies, but Anycoin Direct offers a user-friendly platform that makes it easy to acquire Solana safely and confidently. With just a few clicks, you can become part of the Solana community. Buying Solana is done in six simple steps that ensure you receive your SOL tokens quickly and efficiently.

As the leading crypto exchange in Europe, Anycoin Direct attaches great importance to security and user-friendliness. Your email address and personal information are protected and will not be shared with third parties. In addition, Anycoin Direct is licensed and regulated as a crypto broker, which gives you extra security when buying Solana.