The tokens of Helium, a decentralized mobile network, have been booming in the past days, with protocol token MOBILE leading the way.
MOBILE, a governance token mined by 5G-CBRS and Wi-Fi hotspots, is up more than 60% on the day and a whopping 821% over the week and is currently trading at $0.00632984, per CoinGecko data. Helium’s native cryptocurrency, HNT, is up 2.4% to trade at $7.39, while the IOT token that underpins Helium’s Internet of Things subnetwork is up 11% over the past 24 hours.
The surge in Helium Network tokens follows Helium Mobile’s launch earlier this month of a $20-per-month no-contract smartphone plan that offers unlimited data, calls, and texts, as well as the network’s U.S. rollout.
Helium Mobile provides cellular service across the decentralized Helium network, backed by T-Mobile’s nationwide 5G network. The company claims its subscription bundle is nearly eight times cheaper than the average U.S. monthly cell phone bill. In a Twitter post over the weekend, Helium CEO Amir Haleem claimed the network had reached 12,500 subscribers.
Helium’s 5G network is powered by user-run nodes, and users are rewarded with crypto tokens for sharing their services with nearby subscribers. The network’s token is Solana Blockchain network following migration this year.
Thanks Mike! The last number we released was 12,500 subscribers. As of now, that number is well over that number. We plan to include subscriber counts in our public dashboards in the future.
— Amir 🖐🏻🛡️🎈 (@amirhaleem) December 15, 2023
Helium Network is also benefiting from a surge in interest in the Solana Saga smartphone, which is bundled with a free 30-day subscription to Helium Mobile. The Saga smartphone has been sold out in the US in recent days. This is after cryptocurrency traders noticed that Solana-powered meme coin BONK was bundled with an airdrop. At current prices, it’s worth more than the hardware.
speaking decryptionA Solana spokesperson noted that the blockchain network is monitoring demand for the device to “evaluate what comes next.”
Solana and BONK did not perform well on the final day, following the overall downward trend in the cryptocurrency market as Bitcoin fell below $41,000. Solana is currently trading around $70, down 1.6% on the day, while BONK is down 2.9%.
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