Solana's SOL$100.53 memecoin-driven reputation may soon give way to a deeper role in digital payments, according to a new report from Standard Chartered's head of crypto research, Kendrick Geoffrey.

Given SOL's recent plunge to the $100 level, Kendrick has cut his price forecast for SOL to $250 from $310 by the end of 2026. Kenrick, however, remains a bull, seeing a path to $2,000 by 2030, fueled by Solana's growing role in stablecoin-based micropayments.

The bank describes Solana as moving beyond its “one-trick pony” image. In 2025, nearly half of Solana’s protocol fees came from memecoin trading on decentralized exchanges. But data now shows a shift in trading flows — from meme tokens to SOL-stablecoin pairs — suggesting that new uses are emerging. Stablecoin turnover on Solana now significantly outpaces Ethereum ETH$2,325.24, pointing to a different kind of activity: high-frequency, low-cost transactions.

One example is x402, a platform created by Coinbase (COIN) to support micro-sized, AI-driven payments using stablecoins. The average transaction on x402 is just six cents. Base, Coinbase’s own Layer 2 network on Ethereum, has hosted most of the volume so far, but its fees may be too high for long-term viability. Solana’s lower gas fees — often less than a cent — make it better suited for such applications, Geoffrey said.

Micropayments, often unviable in traditional finance due to fixed per-transaction fees, could unlock new types of internet services, from machine-to-machine payments to social apps with built-in pay-per-use features. Solana’s technical strengths position it to serve as the backend for this kind of infrastructure.

Standard Chartered also points to growing institutional interest. Since October 2025, the Bitwise BSOL ETF has absorbed 78% of all net inflows into SOL-related ETFs, bringing over 1% of the total supply under ETF management, according to Geoffrey. Meanwhile, digital asset treasuries now hold nearly 3% of SOL.

Kendrick's revised targets now project SOL at $400 in 2027, $700 in 2028 and $1,200 in 2029.