NEAR Protocol’s token rose 15% over the past 24 hours to $2.8, extending a month-long rally that has seen the price of NEAR double in the past month.
The move comes amid the success of NEAR Intents, the network’s cross-chain transaction system. The product allows users to request a desired outcome, such as exchanging USDC on Ethereum for SOL on Solana, while third-party solvers perform the transaction behind the scenes.
DefiLlama data shows that NEAR Intents has processed more than $19 billion in cumulative volume and generated about $32 million in fees. The numbers have drawn renewed attention to the protocol after months of limited price movement.
The rally accelerated further after BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes described NEAR, Hyperliquid’s HYPE and ZEC as crypto’s “holy trinity” in a social media post, before suggesting that there is a “long way to go” in its rally.
NEAR gained about 30% as traders rotated back to tokens linked to artificial intelligence and blockchain infrastructure earlier this month, while institutional demand has been increasing. Bitwise NEAR Staking ETP listed in Europe has grown to around $40 million in assets under management after seeing $7 million in inflows in a single week.
Investors are also eyeing an upcoming network upgrade in June that will introduce dynamic resharding. The change is designed to automatically split network shards as demand increases, potentially improving scalability during periods of heavy use.
Despite the recent rise, NEAR remains well below its 2022 peak near $20.
NEAR is a layer-1 blockchain focused on applications, AI infrastructure and cross-chain transactions. The network uses a proof-of-stake model and markets itself as a platform designed to simplify interactions across blockchains while handling large volumes of activity through sharding.
