Sui has recently made headlines by surpassing Solana in daily transaction volume, with its mainnet processing over 40 million transactions on May 3 — a staggering 20x increase from just two days prior. This surge briefly positioned Sui as the most active blockchain by transaction count, outpacing even established layer-1 competitors. However, behind this explosive growth lies a controversial driver: a high-frequency transaction-mining project known as SPAM.
While the numbers look impressive on the surface, closer inspection reveals that much of this activity may be artificial, raising questions about the true health and sustainability of Sui’s ecosystem.
The SPAM Effect: 147 Million Transactions in One Week
The sudden spike in Sui’s transaction volume can be directly traced to SPAM, a mining-based project launched on May 2 that incentivizes users to flood the network with transactions in exchange for tokens. Within just six days of launch, SPAM generated 147 million transactions, contributing significantly to Sui’s overall network load.
This flood of activity wasn’t just noise — it had real economic impact. The project contributed approximately $120,000 in gas fees to the Sui network, boosting validator revenue and demonstrating the chain’s ability to handle high throughput. Additionally, daily active addresses on Sui jumped from around 12,000 on April 29 to over 73,000 by May 6, suggesting increased user engagement.
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Notably, SPAM was created by Juzy, founder of Polymedia, and quickly gained traction with indirect support from the Sui Foundation. On May 5, the official Sui Twitter account shared two posts promoting SPAM, amplifying its visibility. In return, SPAM pushed Sui’s TPS (transactions per second) beyond 800+, validating claims about the network’s scalability.
Sui developers responded positively to the stress test, stating publicly that the network could comfortably sustain SPAM-level throughput — a strong signal of technical robustness.
Mining Rewards vs. Reality: A Losing Proposition for Users
Despite the hype, participating in SPAM mining proves to be economically irrational for most users.
The mechanism is simple: users send repeated transactions on Sui to earn SPAM tokens, with rewards scaled by transaction volume. The protocol mints 1 billion SPAM tokens daily, distributed across all transactions. Based on data from PANews, over 147 million transactions have been executed since launch, yielding roughly 23 SPAM tokens per transaction.
However, when costs are factored in, miners consistently lose money.
Gas fees on Sui average several cents per transaction — often exceeding the dollar value of the earned tokens. At current prices, each SPAM token trades for $0.00001532**, down 92.7% from its peak of $0.0002113. With only $63,700 in market cap** and **$26,000 in liquidity**, the token lacks meaningful economic backing.
In essence, participants are paying more in fees than they receive in rewards — turning SPAM into a net wealth transfer from retail users to validators and early adopters.
Misleading Inflation Claims
To justify the tokenomics, Juzy argued that SPAM does not suffer from inflation because while supply increases daily, the rate of inflation decreases over time. He explained:
“On day 10, 1B tokens are minted against 10B supply (10% inflation). On day 100, 1B tokens are minted against 100B supply (1% inflation).”
While mathematically accurate, this framing ignores fundamental economic principles. A constantly expanding supply without corresponding demand inevitably leads to dilution and devaluation — which is exactly what the price chart shows: a continuous downward trend.
PANews’ own analysis contradicts Juzy’s optimistic narrative, revealing that token supply growth far outpaces any organic demand formation.
Beyond Transaction Count: Measuring Real Ecosystem Health
High transaction volume alone doesn’t equate to a thriving blockchain ecosystem. True vitality comes from sustainable user activity, diverse applications, and growing total value locked (TVL).
When measured against these metrics, Sui still lags significantly behind Solana:
- TVL Comparison: Solana’s TVL stands at ~$4 billion**, while Sui’s is around **$640 million — less than 1/6th the size.
- User Activity: Solana consistently maintains over 800,000 daily active addresses, compared to Sui’s peak of 73,000.
- Token Creation: As of May 5, Solana saw 13,642 new tokens created in one day; Sui had issued 10,811 tokens cumulatively up to May 7.
Moreover, many new projects launching on Sui see minimal adoption. Between May 6 and 7, 11 new trading pairs went live — yet each attracted only 1–2 unique traders, indicating weak organic demand.
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Clearly, SPAM has not catalyzed lasting ecosystem growth. Instead, it appears to be a classic case of "one-wave traffic" — a short-lived burst of activity driven by artificial incentives rather than product-market fit.
Can Sui Build Beyond Hype?
The SPAM phenomenon highlights both strengths and vulnerabilities in Sui’s current strategy.
On the positive side:
- Sui demonstrated exceptional scalability, handling extreme load without degradation.
- It attracted short-term attention and developer curiosity.
- The foundation showed agility in engaging with community-driven experiments.
But long-term success requires more than stress tests and viral gimmicks. To compete with mature ecosystems like Solana, Sui must:
- Incentivize development of real-use dApps (decentralized finance, gaming, social).
- Attract institutional-grade projects with grants and technical support.
- Focus on user retention, not just temporary spikes in metrics.
Relying on mining-driven volume risks creating a hollow metric boom — impressive charts masking an underdeveloped ecosystem.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Q: What caused Sui’s sudden rise in transaction volume?
A: The surge was primarily driven by SPAM, a transaction-mining project that rewards users for sending repetitive transactions on the Sui network.
Q: Is SPAM mining profitable for participants?
A: No. Due to high gas costs relative to token value, most miners lose money. The rewards do not cover transaction fees, making it economically unsustainable.
Q: How does Sui compare to Solana in real ecosystem activity?
A: Solana leads significantly in key metrics like daily active users (~800K+ vs ~73K), TVL (~$4B vs ~$640M), and consistent dApp engagement.
Q: Does high TPS prove Sui is better than other blockchains?
A: High throughput demonstrates technical capability, but real-world utility depends on sustained usage, developer adoption, and economic depth — areas where Sui still needs growth.
Q: Was SPAM officially endorsed by Sui?
A: While not officially launched by the team, Sui’s foundation amplified SPAM through social media posts, indicating tacit support for the experiment.
Q: Can artificial mining projects like SPAM benefit a blockchain long-term?
A: Only if they transition into real ecosystem development. Otherwise, they create misleading metrics and risk eroding trust when the hype fades.
Final Thoughts: Performance vs. Substance
Sui’s ability to process tens of millions of transactions daily is undeniably impressive — a testament to its innovative Move-based architecture and parallel execution engine. But raw performance metrics should not overshadow fundamental questions about ecosystem quality and economic sustainability.
The SPAM episode serves as both a stress test and a cautionary tale. While it validated Sui’s scalability, it also exposed the fragility of growth fueled purely by speculative incentives.
For Sui to evolve from a high-performance testnet curiosity into a leading Web3 platform, it must now focus on nurturing genuine innovation, fostering developer communities, and building applications that solve real problems — not just chase vanity metrics.
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