Bitwise Selects Helius as Exclusive SOL Staking Provider

Bitwise Asset Management, a global crypto asset manager with more than $15 billion in client assets, today announced the launch of the Bitwise Solana ETF (NYSE: BSOL) and selected Helius as their sole staking provider with 100% of their SOL exclusively staked through the Bitwise Onchain Solutions validator that Helius operates.

This partnership represents a major milestone for Solana and crypto more broadly as the Bitwise Solana Staking ETF becomes one of the first U.S. spot Solana Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) with staking. 

By running their own validator, Bitwise is proving their commitment to Solana, and advancing the network’s growth, security, and long-term success. Together with Helius, that commitment is backed by Solana-native expertise and enterprise-grade infrastructure built to deliver the trust, performance, and reliability that institutions expect at scale.

Choosing a Solana Staking ETF Provider

Because Bitwise intends to stake 100% of the Fund’s SOL holdings through the Bitwise Onchain Solutions validator, they needed a Validator-as-a-Service provider that understands how to run performant, compliant, and reliable Solana infrastructure.

Validator Performance

Bitwise chose Helius to operate their Solana validator because they wanted the highest APY to pass back to their stakers.

Solana staking rewards are directly related to a validator's performance. If a validator misses slots, has downtime, or fails to pack full blocks, stakers stand to earn fewer rewards.

As Solana’s top validator with over 14M SOL staked, Helius’s fault-tolerant, performance-optimized nodes currently offer over 6.6% APY, have 100% uptime, and maintain a slot success rate over 99.9%. 

By applying these same performance optimizations to the Bitwise Onchain Solutions validator, and passing block rewards back to stakers, BSOL holders can expect to have an APY of 7%+.

White Glove Customizations

Due to the demanding technical requirements of running a validator for a Solana ETF with built-in staking, Bitwise needed a technology partner with deep, Solana-native expertise, a proven track record, and the engineering talent capable of supporting their sophisticated institutional needs. For Bitwise, we built many custom solutions to meet their unique requirements including solutions for estimating and forecasting APY.

Reporting

Bitwise had advanced requirements for custom, real-time reports and tooling to track and forecast validator rewards, generate daily reports, and adhere to strict reporting requirements. 

Bitwise needed a partner like Helius with specialized domain and technical expertise to build these custom reports that most other providers were simply not equipped to handle.

Compliance

Validator security and regulatory compliance are table stakes. Bitwise chose Helius because we were able to meet their custom requirements around secure key management, operate SOC 2 compliant infrastructure, and because we adhere to security best practices.

Combined with enterprise SLAs, 24/7 customer support, and direct lines of communication to our engineering team, institutional partners like Bitwise always receive first-class support.

Growing Institutional Interest in Solana

Institutional interest in Solana is accelerating, largely due to the adoption of stablecoins, rising application revenue, the emergence of on-chain equities, the expansion of Real World Assets (RWAs), and the growth of Digital Asset Treasury (DAT) companies.

Stablecoins and Blockchain Payment Rails

Stablecoins on Solana reached a new all-time high in mid Oct. 2025 with over $16.6 billion in circulation. This represents a ~245% YoY increase in total supply since Oct. 2024 ($4.8B).

With newer stablecoins like PayPal USD (PYUSD) and Paxos’ Global USD (USDG), combined with Solana’s fast transactions and low fees, the network has quickly become home to many of crypto’s most used mobile banking and stablecoin payment applications.

Solana App Revenue and Trading Activity

Because validator rewards are tied to network activity (e.g., block rewards and MEV rewards), it’s no surprise institutions are interested in staking SOL to earn a portion of these fees.

For example, through the first three quarters of 2025, Solana has generated over:

• $1.2 trillion in total DEX spot trading volume
• $1.8 billion in total application revenue
• $1.3 billion in Real Economic Value (REV)

On-chain Equities & Internet Capital Markets

With the "Project Crypto" initiative from Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Paul Atkins to "modernize the securities rules and regulations to enable America’s financial markets to move on-chain," it’s clear that permissionless, high-throughput, and low cost blockchains like Solana will enable the trading of equities on-chain, and create opportunities for new internet capital markets.

Real-World Assets (RWAs) and Tokenization

Beyond stablecoins, financial institutions are tokenizing real-world assets on Solana, including U.S. treasuries (e.g., Ondo Finance’s USDY), equities (e.g., Opening Bell by Superstate), private credit (e.g., Apollo ACRED), money market funds, commodities, and real estate.

Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs)

To offer investors exposure to digital assets through equity ownership, publicly traded companies are now holding SOL on their balance sheets. 

As of October 2025, 19 publicly disclosed Solana-focused DATs collectively hold over 20 million SOL, which represents ~3.3% of the network’s ~612 million token supply.

Looking Ahead

Solana ETFs with staking mark a turning point for crypto in the United States. U.S. investors can now access Solana via ETFs and earn passive yield through staking.

As more institutions look to deploy capital on Solana, it’s clear that every financial institution will need a strategy for integrating digital assets and crypto rails into their products.

If you’re a Solana ETF issuer, DAT or institutional asset manager, email sales@helius.xyz to learn how we can help you maximize staking rewards with customized staking solutions.

About Bitwise

Bitwise Asset Management is a global crypto asset manager with more than $15 billion in client assets and a suite of over 30 crypto investment products spanning ETFs, separately managed accounts, private funds, hedge fund strategies, and staking. The firm has a seven-year track record and today serves more than 4,000 private wealth teams, RIAs, family offices, and institutional investors, as well as 15 banks and broker-dealers. The Bitwise team of over 100 technology and investment professionals is backed by leading institutional investors and has offices in San Francisco, New York, and London.