Fantom is witnessing a remarkable resurgence in anticipation of its highly awaited Sonic upgrade.
Over the past 30 days, Fantom’s FTM token has soared by 137%, reaching a 23-month high of $0.974 on March 16, according to CoinGecko.
Notably, FTM’s trading volume has surged by over 1,000% since mid-October, while the total value locked (TVL) in Fantom-based DeFi protocols has surged by 236% during the same period, as reported by DeFiLlama.
Despite this impressive surge, Fantom’s TVL is still down by 98.6% from its all-time high in January 2022, which stood at nearly $12.4 billion.
The significant rise in FTM’s performance coincides with the imminent launch of Fantom’s upcoming Sonic upgrade, scheduled for this spring.
Sonic heralds the introduction of a new smart contract coding language and execution engine in the Fantom Virtual Machine, marking a departure from the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) previously utilized by Fantom.
Moreover, the Fantom Virtual Machine maintains EVM compatibility, enabling developers to seamlessly transition code from Ethereum to Fantom.
The Fantom Foundation initiated public and closed testnets for Sonic back in October 2023. In a blog post on March 13, the foundation reported a remarkable 95% reduction in transaction costs on the testnet.
Today, #Fantom is thrilled to announce the launch of the #FantomSonic testnet environment!
Sonic’s three main upgrades include:
• Fantom Virtual Machine, which offers drastically faster smart contract execution compared to the old EVM.
• Carmen database storage, which uses a… pic.twitter.com/shovQtzMkd
— Fantom Foundation (@FantomFDN) October 24, 2023
The post highlighted that Fantom simulated various transaction types, including token transfers, asset minting, and multi-step swaps, on the closed testnet. Following the mainnet launch of Sonic, the network is expected to support a “realistic” throughput of 2,000 transactions per second (TPS) with one-second finality.
Additional tests indicated the network’s capability to process up to 4,000 token swaps and 10,000 transfers per second, particularly when focusing on these transaction types exclusively.
Sonic aims to achieve a 90% reduction in storage costs and introduce an enhanced consensus mechanism. The Fantom Foundation has already upgraded numerous archive nodes on the mainnet to support Sonic.
Through the Sonic upgrade, Fantom endeavors to unlock new possibilities in DeFi and Web3 gaming applications.
