Fantom, launched in 2019, is a Layer-1 EVM-compatible blockchain that quickly gained recognition for its unparalleled speed and low transaction fees. By March 2022, it established a robust decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem peaking at an impressive $8 billion in Total Value Locked (TVL), driven by a vibrant ecosystem of community-driven decentralized applications (dApps).
Fantom L1 Historical TVL (Mar 2021 – Jul 2022) – Source: DeFiLlama
Fantom was not just another L1 that rose to stardom by chance.
Central to Fantom’s success was its visionary leadership, including Andre Cronje, often hailed as the “Godfather of DeFi.” Cronje’s pioneering contributions, such as Yearn Finance, which popularized yield farming, and Solidly’s VE(3,3) MetaDEX, have left an indelible mark on DeFi and the broader blockchain landscape.
Onward: The Sonic L1 Thesis
Building on Fantom’s legacy, Sonic is positioned not merely as just another blockchain. It represents a next-generation evolution of EVM-compatible ecosystems, offering not only scalability and optimization but also a fertile foundation for a thriving decentralized ecosystem. Sonic is backed by a team of seasoned experts, whose track record in DeFi primitives and ecosystem development establishes a high level of trust among developers and users alike. With proven credentials in blockchain innovation, Sonic is uniquely poised to attract high-quality applications that will drive sustained activity and growth, setting the stage to become a leading ecosystem in 2025.
Report Summary
By leveraging Fantom’s achievements and its team’s proven expertise, Sonic is ready to carve its place as a cornerstone of the blockchain industry.
This report offers a detailed thesis on why Sonic stands out and what to expect as it scales to new heights by delving into the following:
- Highlights of Sonic blockchain performance, multi-faceted ecosystem showcase, and initiatives that makes Sonic ecosystem one of its kind.
- Outline of Sonic’s novel core architecture and enhancements from the Sonic Upgrade enabling a highly-performant and scalable blockchain.
- $S tokenomics, bifurcated airdrop incentive model for self-sustaining ecosystem growth, and the $S thesis for potential growth.
Sonic: The Premier DeFi Hub
An Accelerating Ecosystem
Sonic Blockchain Historical TVL – Source: DefiLlama
Sonic’s growth and long-term sustainability are anchored in its ecosystem resilience and strong foundational support. As one of the fastest-growing chains by total value locked (TVL), Sonic has added $330 million USD, cementing its position among the top Layer 1 platforms with momentum still building. By fostering an ecosystem rich in developer activity, applications, and strategic partnerships, Sonic is solidifying its place as a leader in the blockchain space, paving the way for a thriving and sustainable future.
A Multifaceted Ecosystem: Bridging Established dApps with Emerging Innovators
Sonic Ecosystem Map – Source: Sonic Insider X
The Sonic ecosystem has experienced impressive on-chain growth, with over 40 new applications deployed in 2025 ahead of the highly anticipated mainnet launch. Building on Fantom’s foundation, Sonic features innovative dApps like Beets (flagship native liquid staking protocol), Equalizer VE(3,3) DEX, and SpookySwap, that excelled during the previous successful cycle on Fantom Opera.
Bringing Sonic DeFi to Greater Heights
Additionally, several established DeFi leaders have announced strategic integrations into the Sonic ecosystem, further solidifying its position as a hub for innovation. Notable contributors include Curve Finance (the second-largest DEX on Ethereum), Vertex Protocol (a leading player in the perpetual DEX space with a strong presence on Arbitrum One), Solv Protocol, and StakeStone, two of the most prominent liquid staking protocols in the Bitcoin liquid staking space. Recently, notable key partnerships have been announced:
Aave V3 Deployment on Sonic
Deploy Aave v3 on Sonic Temperature Check – Source: Aave Governance
Aave’s governance approval to launch on Sonic mainnet in Q1 highlights the ecosystem’s growing appeal and potential. This comes with a pledge of $15 million in funding from the Sonic Foundation to support a seamless transition and foster a robust environment for Aave’s deployment.
The support includes migration incentives, 50 million native Sonic tokens, and 20 million USDC in liquidity supply, underlining Sonic’s commitment to supporting key integrations and delivering a user-friendly experience.
Premier Yield Sector: Sonic x Pendle Finance
Sonic Labs x Pendle Finance – Source: X
Building on its proven product-market fit during Fantom L1’s peak, Sonic continues to attract high-impact projects. Partnerships with innovative protocols like Pendle further reinforce its position as a platform for transformative DeFi solutions.
Rings Protocol: Native Yield-Bearing Meta-assets
Rings Protocol Explained – Source: Sonic Labs Blog
Rings Protocol, built on Veda BoringVaults, combines automated yield optimization with inspiration from Blast’s native yield concept and Solidly’s ve(3,3) model. These automated vaults farm yield across DeFi protocols while introducing native yield, allowing bridged assets like ETH to generate yield on the source chain while maintaining equivalent assets on the destination chain. The protocol revolves around two key assets: scUSD and scETH minted via fee-free by depositing stablecoins or ETH-based tokens, with collateral deployed to yield-farming strategies on Ethereum. This dual-chain approach unlocks both yield generation and utility for Sonic’s ecosystem, making Rings a pivotal player in DeFi innovation.
Expanding DEX Innovation: SwapXFi (by Algebra)
SwapXFi on Sonic Blockchain – Source: X
Beyond the core suite of DEXs in the Sonic ecosystem, innovative platforms like SwapX are expanding the landscape with advanced liquidity solutions. Powered by Algebra’s modular Concentrated Liquidity AMM (CLAMM) V4, SwapX optimizes trading efficiency while enhancing capital utilization for both traders and liquidity providers. With $17M+ TVL secured and 24h trading volumes reaching $15M, it demonstrates the strength of Algebra’s infrastructure and Sonic’s growing varsity of DeFi innovations and ecosystem activity.
Real World Assets (RWA) on Sonic
Real-World Assets on Sonic With Backed, Chainlink, and Fortlake Asset Management – Source: Sonic Labs Blog
Sonic is taking a major step in bridging traditional finance and DeFi by partnering with Backed, Chainlink, and Fortlake Asset Management to tokenize Fortlake’s Sigma Opportunities Fund. This initiative brings traditional financial assets on-chain via the Sonic blockchain, leveraging Chainlink’s real-time price oracle services and cross-chain liquidity solutions to ensure seamless DeFi integration.
The tokenization of Fortlake’s Sigma Fund represents a major milestone as the first fund to leverage Backed’s Tokenization-as-a-Service platform. This not only highlights Backed’s expertise in asset tokenization, but also marks its strategic expansion into private fund tokenization. Sonic serves as the ideal platform for this groundbreaking initiative as the RWA landscape gradually matures.
Pioneering the Future of DeFAI: HeyAnon x Sonic
HeyAnon x Shadow Integration Announcement – Source: X
Venturing into the AI space, Sonic has emerged as the home of Anon, a rapidly growing project focused on DeFi and AI (DeFAI) that has reportedly achieved a remarkable 20x growth, underscoring the rising momentum of DeFAI on the platform.
Spearheaded by crypto visionary Daniele, Anon aims to establish itself as the next crypto superapp, designed to onboard billions into Web3. At its core, DeFAI seeks to revolutionize the DeFi experience by integrating next-generation AI-driven automation with an intuitive, abstracted interface, essential for attracting non-crypto-native users.
For DeFAI to thrive, it requires a robust DeFi ecosystem with diverse services and yield opportunities—a need Sonic fulfils through its innovative projects. Building on this synergy, HeyAnon has partnered with Shadow Exchange, a cutting-edge x(3,3) DEX on Sonic, to integrate AI-native features through its AUTOMATE framework, setting the stage for a seamless blend of DeFi and AI innovation.
These integrations showcase Sonic’s potential to not only drive advancements across core DeFi sectors but also establish itself as an innovative hub, fostering new and emerging narratives. By leveraging its robust underlying DeFi ecosystem, Sonic creates a virtuous cycle of growth and innovation, attracting further adoption and development.
Beyond DeFi: Expansion into NFTs & GameFi
While Sonic is home to a strong foundation of DeFi dApps, its ecosystem extends far beyond finance, fostering a vibrant NFT and GameFi landscape.
NFT Innovation with PaintSwap
Paintswap Homepage – Source: Paintswap
Sonic’s NFT ecosystem is anchored by PaintSwap, a decentralized NFT marketplace and launchpad, offering seamless NFT trading and an accessible entry point for users looking to engage with NFTs. This platform strengthens Sonic’s NFT infrastructure, providing a hub for both collectors and creators.
GameFi on Sonic: Next-Gen Blockchain Gaming
Sonic is also establishing itself as a hub for GameFi, hosting innovative blockchain-based games that integrate financial incentives and unique token economies. So far, it has three established projects:
- BattleDogs Arena: A cross-chain NFT battle card game, utilizing microtransactions to enable Universal Basic Income and advance GameFAI.
- Estfor Kingdom: A fully on-chain medieval MMORPG with idle gameplay, clan battles, quests, pets, and an in-game $BRUSH economy.
- Sacra: Falling of Myrd: A dark fantasy RPG, pioneering true on-chain ownership with integrated financial incentives.
With its expanding GameFi and NFT ecosystem, Sonic continues to push the boundaries of blockchain applications beyond DeFi, creating a diverse and thriving ecosystem.
Multi-faceted Ecosystem Support
DeFAI Hackathon
Sonic DeFAI Hackathon – Source: Sonic Labs Blog
Sonic’s championing of innovation within the AI sector does not stop there. Sonic Labs is taking a stop further by organising the Sonic DeFAI Hackathon in collaboration with HeyAnon, DoraHacks and Zerebro as partners, offering up to $250,000 in prizes to focused on meaningful AI-related development efforts while leveraging on Sonic’s technology stack to foster innovation on the Sonic blockchain ecosystem.
Ecosystem Vault
Ecosystem Vault – Source: Fantom
Fantom Opera has ongoing initiatives to support ecosystem development, including an existing Ecosystem Vault that collects 10% of cumulative network transaction fees for community-wide distribution. This program will be updated to provide quarterly disbursements to the Sonic Community Council (SCC), an independently operated collective of active ecosystem members. In collaboration with the Sonic Foundation, the SCC will use these funds to support user-focused programs, developer onboarding, and app support.
On-chain Monitoring: Sonic on Dune Analytics
Democratizing access to on-chain analytics is crucial for effective monitoring and growth tracking. Sonic is now integrated with Dune, a leading permissionless platform for building analytical dashboards. Users can access detailed on-chain data to analyze key metrics such as transaction volumes, smart contract interactions, and dApp adoption. This unlocks valuable insights into Sonic’s network performance, ecosystem development, and cross-chain interoperability with Ethereum and other blockchains, empowering the community to track the ecosystem’s evolution in real time.
TLDR: A Bright Future Ahead for Sonic
The Sonic ecosystem is uniquely positioned with a strong blend of innovative legacy dApps from its Fantom Opera success and a new wave of blue-chip dApps with established distribution. This creates a fertile environment for DeFi adoption, offering diverse opportunities across the ecosystem. Sonic’s inclusivity extends to emerging sectors like RWA, DeFAI, and socialFi/gaming, further enhancing its appeal. Coupled with robust development activity and comprehensive on-chain analytics, Sonic presents an attractive platform for both users and builders to drive future growth.
“Super” Sonic Chain: EVM, But Superior
Sonic Chain: A Tailored Solution
Sonic aims to deliver a seamless, lightning-fast user experience for blockchain applications, combining instant-finality transactions with Web2-like speed, interoperability, and autonomy.
Fantom VS. Sonic Performance Comparison – Source: Chainspect
By building on Fantom’s legacy, Sonic delivers significant improvements across key performance metrics, including throughput-per-second (TPS) and block times. These upgrades translate into a 2.60x increase in maximum recorded TPS, a 32.3x boost in maximum theoretical TPS, and a 36.3% reduction in block time, as measured over the past 30 days.
With full EVM compatibility, Sonic can handle an impressive 10,000 transactions per second (TPS) while maintaining sub-second finality and verifiable throughput. These advancements make Sonic a robust and scalable foundation for innovative blockchain applications, offering unparalleled performance and efficiency to meet the demands of modern decentralized ecosystems.
Sonic Upgrade: Novel Implementations
Sonic is not just another fast mainstream EVM Layer 1. It’s meticulously engineered with innovative features that enhance scalability through a superior virtual machine, while ensuring economic sustainability to drive network effects and uphold robust security for ecosystem growth.
Virtual Machine
The Virtual Machine (VM) redefines blockchain performance with dynamic translation, converting EVM bytecode into a more efficient format in real-time and caching these conversions to save execution time for repeated operations. Its innovative “super-instructions” consolidate frequently used code patterns into single execution units, significantly reducing computational overhead. Additionally, the FVM features hashing caching to eliminate repetitive cryptographic calculations and JUMPDEST analysis caching, which pre-scans bytecode to ensure secure and efficient execution paths. This advanced design accelerates transaction processing, enhances scalability, and provides a high-performance, adaptive blockchain infrastructure tailored for the demands of modern decentralized applications.
Fee Monetization (FeeM): Redefining Blockchain Incentives
Sonic unveils a revolutionary fee-sharing model, inspired by Web2 ad-revenue systems, designed to address the challenges faced by development teams in existing ecosystems. With FeeM, up to 90% of network fees are redistributed to dApps, providing a sustainable revenue stream that enables developers to scale their platforms and expand their user bases effectively. This forward-thinking approach incentivizes innovation while ensuring the ecosystem’s longevity and economic sustainability.
Next-Gen Database Storage
Traditional EVM storage mechanisms are highly inefficient, with a significant portion of processing time consumed by StateDB operations. To overcome these limitations, Sonic introduces a next-generation storage solution that reduces storage requirements by 65% for validators, while significantly improving blockchain state management.
Its dual-framework architecture introduces LiveDB for real-time validator operations and ArchiveDB for historical state storage, enabling continuous live pruning to eliminate bottlenecks common in traditional EVM blockchains. Additionally, its flat storage design replaces tree-like structures (e.g., MPTs) with sequential storage, streamlining data retrieval, enhancing performance, and maintaining cryptographic integrity for validators and archive nodes.
Summary
The introduction of these technological advancements not only significantly enhances Sonic’s technical performance by building on Fantom’s foundation with cutting-edge features but also incorporates economic primitives to create a cost-efficient development environment. This approach fosters greater innovation across the ecosystem, establishing Sonic as a robust, scalable, and economically sustainable blockchain platform tailored for modern dApps.
Sonic Tokenomics and Incentive Model
$S: The Heart of Sonic
At the core of Sonic’s ecosystem lies the $S token, transitioning from $FTM to serve as the native gas token on the Sonic chain. This token plays a crucial role in powering the network, enabling payment for transaction fees, staking for validator rewards, and participation in governance initiatives. With its pivotal function, $S aligns economic incentives with the ecosystem’s growth and sustainability.
Upon Sonic’s launch, the total supply of $S will mirror Fantom’s previous supply of 3.175 billion $FTM. Holders will be able to exchange 1 $FTM for 1 $S, ensuring a seamless transition.
Balanced Future Token Minting
Sonic Governance Vote 3 – Source: Sonic Network Governance
Sonic’s fee model strikes a balance between short-term utility and long-term value preservation. Validators are rewarded with proportional earnings from network fees, supported by a gradual inflationary program set to begin six months after Sonic’s launch.
This design minimizes the dilutive impact on $S’s market value and FDV. An annual burn mechanism ensures that 100% of newly minted tokens are allocated exclusively for network growth, with any unused tokens burned to maintain meaningful token utilization.
Long-term Growth Funding: Ongoing Funding and Inflation Control
To fuel long-term growth, the network will mint an additional 1.5% of $S annually for six years, beginning six months after the mainnet launch. These tokens will fund key initiatives, including:
- Expanding $S adoption globally.
- Scaling operations and the Sonic team.
- Launching marketing and DeFi onboarding campaigns.
- Supporting innovation via programs like Sonic Spark and Sonic University.
Unused tokens from this initiative will be burned at the end of each year, ensuring that all newly minted tokens are allocated solely for network growth, protecting against inflation and maintaining economic stability.
$S Airdrop: Bifurcated Incentive Model
~200M $S Airdrop Campaign Program
Sonic Airdrop Dashboard – Source: Sonic Labs
Following recent mainnet launch, the S airdrop campaign commences with a dual-reward framework allocating 190,500,000 $S to incentivize both users and developers on the Sonic chain and Opera. The distribution is divided into two categories:
- Sonic Points: Reward quality developer contributions to strengthen the ecosystem’s foundation.
- Sonic Gems: Encourage meaningful user activity to foster engagement and network growth.
Additional rewards have also been allocated for historical activity on Opera, participation in Sonic Arcade, and minters of the exclusive Shard NFT.
For more information on how the airdrop program works refer to this *link.*
Deflationary Airdrop Distribution Mechanism
Airdrop Deflationary (Burn) Mechanism – Source: Sonic Documentation
The first season of the S airdrop becomes claimable six months after Sonic’s launch (June 2025). Upon claim, 25% of the allocation is unlocked immediately, while the remaining 75% vests over 270 days as NFT positions with a linear decay mechanism. Users can claim early but incur a penalty, burning a portion of their tokens. This mechanism prevents sudden supply surges, incentivizes on-chain activity, and ensures a balanced, controlled token distribution.
The $S Bull Thesis
$FTM → $S: An Oscillator
$FTM Historical Market Capitalization – Source: DefiLlama
$S inherits a strong legacy from $FTM, which gained prominence during the 2021 cryptocurrency bull cycle as a standout L1 platform hosting innovative and novel dApps. $FTM market capitalization (MCAP) peaked at $8.33 billion USD back in January 2022, with strong revival to $3.89 billion USD recently in December 2024.
This foundation has paved the way for a broad and mature token distribution, further supported by the team’s ongoing commitment to innovation within the Sonic blockchain. This dedication underscores their long-term alignment with creating a thriving and sustainable ecosystem.
Potential Listing Opportunities for $S
Additionally, $S is already listed on top-tier centralized exchanges like Binance and OKX, establishing a strong foundation for effective price discovery. With anticipated listings on major platforms like Coinbase and Upbit, there is substantial upside potential for expanding exchange presence in untapped regions, driving greater adoption and enhancing market visibility.
Strategic Accreditations
Sonic’s growth is driven by collaborations with prominent angel investors and venture partners, including:
- Angel Investors: Michael (Curve), Stani (Aave), Robert (Compound), Tarun (Gauntlet), and Sam (FRAX).
- Venture Partners: Hashed, Signum Capital, and UOB Venture Management.
These strategic alliances enhance Sonic’s credibility and attract key partnerships, establishing a robust ecosystem with numerous established dApps—setting Sonic apart from other existing blockchain networks.
Final Thoughts
Sonic distinguishes itself from competitors by making a transformative leap in blockchain innovation, building upon Fantom’s established ecosystem as a solid foundation.
The Sonic upgrade introduces cutting-edge advancements, including a superior virtual machine and optimized storage mechanisms, setting new benchmarks for scalability, efficiency, and performance. Strengthened by robust partnerships and powered by best-in-class dApps, Sonic positions itself as a premier platform for decentralized innovation.
With a bullish long-term outlook for its ecosystem, translating to value accrual for $S, alongside strong narratives and key catalysts, Sonic is poised to emerge as a leading blockchain platform in 2025.
Authors: @0xCheeezzyyyy, Memento Research
This report was written in partnership with Sonic. This report has been prepared for informational purposes only. It does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, trading advice, or any other sort of advice, and you should not treat any of the report’s content as such.