Kyle Samani (카일 사마니), a co-founder of crypto venture capital firm Multicoin, argued that Solana could overtake Ethereum by market capitalisation in the current upswing cycle.

On Sept. 21, blockchain media outlet Cointelegraph reported that Samani said Solana is ahead of Ethereum in usability and functionality, and more crypto companies will choose Solana over Ethereum.

He also questioned Ethereum's current standing. Samani said "hardly anyone actually uses Ethereum today" and viewed it as maintaining its position through stablecoins and stablecoin structures borrowed against Ethereum collateral. He also expressed a negative view of Ethereum's ability to accumulate value, even though it is the largest smart contract network.

He also took a negative stance on Ethereum from an investment perspective. Although Ethereum is the biggest smart contract network, he said it is unclear whether value can be properly accumulated. He also argued it is hard to understand why investors would want to hold Ethereum at the current valuation and that there are more reasonable investment opportunities.

By contrast, he described Solana as a network that is advantageous for integration into business operations. He called Solana the most functional network and said the more crypto companies try to simplify their business structures, the more likely they are to shift toward Solana.

In terms of market moves, the two assets have moved in similar directions in the latest rally. Over the past month, Ethereum has risen 30 percent and Solana 34 percent. Solana is moving off a smaller market capitalisation, and its declines were larger during bear markets. Based on the past year, Solana is down 59 percent and Ethereum 45 percent.

In on-chain revenue metrics, Solana led Ethereum. Solana recorded $23 million in fees over the past 30 days, ranking fourth by monthly fees. Over the same period, Ethereum ranked sixth with $12.6 million. Solana's market capitalisation is about 20 percent of Ethereum's, but its weekly and monthly fees have already surpassed the Ethereum network.

Samani's remarks also connect to his past track record. He said he first encountered permissionless finance and smart contracts through Ethereum in 2016 and has cited that as what brought him into crypto. He added that he lost trust in Ethereum after becoming disappointed with its development direction for addressing scalability issues.

He later co-founded Multicoin in May 2017, then came across Solana and led part of Solana's early investment round in 2018. That investment became a representative success case for Multicoin.

Samani said in February that, looking back on 10 years in the crypto investment industry, he would step down from his role as managing partner at Multicoin. In September, he joined the U.S. board of crypto trading platform Backpack.

Samani's comments show that competition between Solana and Ethereum is shifting to which network draws in more companies and capital. The market is expected to watch whether Solana's fee growth translates into a real expansion of network dominance, and how Ethereum responds to questions about actual use and value accumulation.