Nansen and Sanctum have launched a new liquid staking framework on Solana designed to make staking SOL as easy as swapping a token.
The system, dubbed the “universal staking router”, links multiple liquid staking tokens (LSTs) such as mSOL, jitoSOL, and bSOL into one standardized route.
Instead of users choosing individual validators or juggling different staking pools, Sanctum automatically directs deposits to the best-performing validator mix, while Nansen supplies the analytics layer that tracks these flows in real time.
The launch marks a concrete attempt to standardize Solana’s fragmented staking market, which has grown large but disjointed. The chain hosts $11.6 billion in total value locked (TVL), with $15.5 billion in stablecoins and roughly $1.34 million in daily chain revenue.
Yet staking liquidity remains split across distinct protocols: Jupiter ($3.44 b TVL), Kamino ($3.29 b), Jito ($2.94 b), and Sanctum ($2.53 b) each operate semi-isolated pools that limit capital reuse.Solana’s new staking backbone
At its core, Sanctum’s router turns staking into a liquidity problem, not a governance one. By connecting pools under a shared standard, the framework allows users to mint or swap between LSTs through unified liquidity rather than fragmented order books.
This change also makes Solana’s DeFi stack, DEXs like Raydium and Drift, perps, and lending markets more efficient, since LSTs can now move freely between them without custom integrations.
Nansen’s role is to quantify this network. Its dashboards map validator performance, staking yield, and liquidity depth across the new rails, helping users identify optimal routes and enabling institutions to track flows with the same transparency they already have for Ethereum’s LST markets.
This collaboration lands during a volatile phase for Solana DeFi. Across the top protocols, 7-day TVL losses range from -4 % to -27 %, with monthly drops above 10 % in several major pools.
Even as the network posts 2 million daily active addresses and $4.5 million in daily inflows, fragmentation has weighed on staking growth. Sanctum’s router attempts to reverse that by consolidating liquidity into a single infrastructure layer.
Can Solana pull liquidity from Ethereum?
The big test is whether unified LSTs can compete with Ethereum’s mature ecosystem, where Lido’s stETH dominates with over $30 billion in deposits. Solana’s edge lies in speed and cost: swapping or minting an LST costs fractions of a cent, while Ethereum L2s still rely on complex bridging and higher fees.
The new routing standard also makes Solana’s validator market more competitive: yields, not branding, determine where deposits flow.
The yield math favors Solana. Liquid staking currently offers 5-8 % returns, versus 3-4 % on ETH, and easier liquidity routing lowers the opportunity cost of staying staked. If adoption accelerates, this could redirect part of the capital rotation away from Ethereum rollups toward Solana’s high-throughput base layer.
Solana’s network economics are stabilizing even after a short-term DeFi cooldown. Its $197 price, paired with its $107 billion market cap, shows resilience despite TVL compression. Sanctum’s rollout could increase this if it reignites staking participation. Liquidity routing encourages more SOL to stay within on-chain derivatives instead of moving to centralized exchanges.
That feedback loop (staking → liquidity → DeFi reuse) mirrors what turned Ethereum’s stETH into a structural pillar of on-chain finance. If Sanctum’s rails succeed, Solana could replicate that dynamic faster thanks to its unified execution layer.
The key difference is that Solana’s validators and restaking programs are natively composable, allowing future features like instant unstaking or cross-LST lending without new token standards.
Why does this matter?
Liquid staking has long been Solana’s missing piece. While the chain dominates NFT and DEX volumes, staking liquidity has lagged behind its throughput narrative.
Sanctum and Nansen are trying to fix that by creating a data-informed, interoperable LST network that behaves like a protocol rather than a product. There are still open questions. How will liquidity migrate between the older LSTs and Sanctum’s router?
Will protocols integrate their routing layer at the contract level or rely on front-end partnerships? And what happens to MEV distribution once routes consolidate under a few large pools?
For now, the numbers show promise. Even with market-wide contraction, staking-related protocols still make up nearly a fifth of Solana’s $11.6 billion TVL. Binance Staked SOL holds $1.95 billion, Bybit’s pool has $358 million, and Sanctum already has $2.53 billion within weeks of launch.
If unified LST rails succeed in merging those flows, Solana could gain a structural liquidity moat that Ethereum’s L2s can’t easily replicate.
The new rails are less about hype than infrastructure. In crypto, friction decides adoption, and Sanctum just removed one of Solana’s biggest sources of it.
