Laser-Eyed Franklin Templeton Sets Sights on Ethereum, Solana After Bitcoin

By Jason Nelson

In a series of tweets on Wednesday, global investment firm Franklin Templeton opined about the merits of layer one blockchain Solana and Ethereum, leading to speculation about the investment giant’s next move.

One of the largest asset management companies in the world, Franklin Templeton, manages over $1.4 trillion in assets.

“We believe as blockchains improve in fees and performance, the potential use cases that are unlocked grow exponentially,” the Franklin Templeton digital asset team said. “Improving the economics and experience for the end user cannot be overstated.”

Last week, Franklin Templeton joined other major firms, including BlackRock, VanEck, Ark Invest, and Fidelity, in having their spot Bitcoin ETFs approved by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Franklin Templeton expressed admiration for the Solana blockchain, calling Solana Labs co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko's vision of it as a single atomic state machine a “powerful use case.”

“On Solana, we see Anatoly’s vision of a single atomic state machine as a powerful use case of decentralized blockchains, lowering information asymmetry,” they said. “And we are impressed by all the activity seen on Solana in Q4 2023.”

Projects driving the activity on the Solana Blockchain Franklin Templeton highlighted include DePIN, meme coins, NFTs, DeFi, and the high-performance validator client Firedancer.

The account also expressed excitement about Ethereum and its ecosystem, highlighting the growing pains of the largest proof-of-stake blockchain.

“We are excited about ETH and its ecosystem,” the company said. “Despite the midlife crisis it's recently experienced, we see a bright future with many strong tailwinds to push the Ethereum ecosystem forward.”

The firm highlighted several factors that it believes contribute positively to the Ethereum ecosystem's momentum, including EIP 4844, developments in alternative data availability (Alt DA), community revitalization, and restaking.

The Franklin Templeton account went on to say the company believes other layer-one blockchains besides Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana have potential.

“Other L1s outside of BTC, ETH, SOL have massive potential, and we are continuing to support, monitor, and develop on these networks as they grow and mature,” they said.

“The lawyers won't let us respond to comments, but we hear you,” the account concluded.

When asked to comment on the tweets, a Franklin Templeton spokesperson declined to comment further.

“We cannot comment on any potential future fund offerings, but we can say that we are continuously monitoring developments in the digital assets and ETF ecosystems for opportunities to diversify our off,” the spokesperson told Decrypt.

Edited by Ryan Ozawa.

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