BitMart Research—Reframing the On-Chain Narrative: What New Story Is Base Telling?
Mahe, Seychelles, July 01, 2025 — BitMart Research, the research arm of BitMart Exchange, has released a comprehensive analysis on the resurgence of the Base ecosystem, highlighting its explosive growth, evolving narratives, and rising institutional alignment. As daily active addresses, TVL, and transaction volumes reach new highs, Base is rapidly transitioning from a speculative L2 to a foundational layer for compliant, on-chain financial and content infrastructure. With support from Coinbase’s strategic initiatives and breakout projects like Virtual and Kaito redefining launch dynamics and the attention economy, Base is emerging as a pivotal force in bridging traditional finance and Web3 innovation.
1. Recent Developments in the Base Ecosystem
Since the end of May 2025, Base has entered a clear period of ecological “explosion.” Key metrics such as daily active addresses, total value locked (TVL), and daily transaction count have surged significantly. The main driver behind this explosive growth is the emergence of multiple trending narratives within the Base ecosystem, each generating waves of market hype and drawing substantial attention.
From a macro perspective, the recent IPO of Circle has sparked renewed investor optimism around the concept of stablecoins in global equity markets. This optimism, especially amid expectations of a more favorable regulatory environment, has positioned Base as an increasingly attractive option for traditional institutions.
User Growth: The number of active addresses has grown exponentially, recently hitting a record high of 3.6 million.
TVL Surge: Base’s total value locked climbed from $2.8 billion in early May to a peak of nearly $4 billion, matching its bull market highs in 2024.
On-Chain Activity: Since May, daily on-chain transactions have averaged nearly 9 million, reaching the peak levels of the 2024 bull cycle.
2. Trending Projects in the Base Ecosystem
Virtual: Pump.fun + Bn Alpha-Style Launch Mechanism Sparks Market Frenzy
Among the many trending projects in the Base ecosystem, Virtual has undoubtedly become one of the most closely watched by the market. Leveraging an innovative token launch mechanism, it has rapidly attracted a large influx of capital and users, emerging as the flagship project in Base’s ongoing “launch narrative.” The price of VIRTUAL rose from $0.50 in mid-April to a peak of $2.50 in early June—a 400% gain.
The key advantages of Virtual’s launch model include:
Ultra-low fundraising price: Each new project raises funding based on a fixed valuation of 42,425 VIRTUAL (approximately $224,000), allowing users to participate at extremely low entry prices. This creates substantial profit potential once the token goes live.
Linear token vesting: Unlike MEME launches on Pump.fun, tokens in Virtual’s launchpad projects are not fully unlocked at listing. Instead, they follow a transparent vesting model similar to VC-backed tokens, with tokens released in tranches. Moreover, to prevent immediate sell-offs by project teams, all raised funds are injected directly into the initial liquidity pool rather than handed over to the team.
Low participation risk: If a launch fails to meet its fundraising target, users receive a full refund. Additionally, Virtual only features a few new launches per day, meaning the overall project quality tends to be higher than most MEME tokens—making user participation relatively low-risk.
Reduced rug-pull potential: Virtual imposes a 1% trading fee, 70% of which is returned to the project team. This incentivizes teams to focus on increasing trading volume rather than cashing out quickly, creating a more sustainable ecosystem loop.
However, as the platform gained popularity, early users frequently adopted a strategy of selling immediately after token launch to capture short-term gains. This behavior led to heavy selling pressure on new projects, undermining overall ecosystem stability. In response, Virtual introduced a “Green Lock” mechanism in mid-June, imposing a mandatory lock-up period on token allocations for launch participants. During this period, users are prohibited from selling their tokens; violating this rule results in a suspension of points accumulation.
While this mechanism helps curb early dumping and extends project lifespans, it also significantly alters the speculative logic that drove initial enthusiasm. Users now face longer profit cycles and lower capital efficiency, leading to a temporary cooling of market sentiment. Since mid-June, the price of VIRTUAL has entered a downward trend, falling from its peak to $1.69—a decline of over 37%.
Kaito: The Leading Project in the Attention Economy
Kaito stands as the leading project in the emerging “Information Finance” (InfoFi) sector. Since May, its token price has surged from $0.79 to a peak of $2.41, marking an increase of nearly 205%.
At the core of Kaito’s appeal is its Yaps module, which tokenizes user attention by rewarding those who post content on X (formerly Twitter). By incentivizing high-quality content creation around trending projects—such as Berachain, Monad, and Initia—Kaito has built a Web3-native content-driven influence model. This mechanism has significantly boosted community engagement. Coupled with weekly airdrops and leaderboard rewards, users are empowered to both “speak” and “monetize,” attracting a growing number of content creators and thought leaders. This dynamic has played a key role in driving the growth of social and narrative-driven content on the Base network.
3. Coinbase and the Future Trajectory of Base
In June 2025, the U.S. Senate passed the GENIUS Stablecoin Act, establishing a formal legal framework for USD-backed stablecoins. This marked the first time that regulatory authorities legally recognized digital assets' compliance status. Against this backdrop, Coinbase, as a fully compliant U.S.-based exchange, has launched a three-pronged strategic layout around Base:
1. Enabling Regulated On-Chain Asset Access — Bridging Coinbase Balances to Base
Coinbase is currently deepening the integration between its centralized trading platform and the Base chain. It has rolled out the Verified Pools feature, allowing KYC-verified users to interact directly with Base dApps using their Coinbase account balances—eliminating the need to switch wallets or perform manual on-chain transfers.
Uniswap and Aerodrome have already been announced as the primary DEXs supporting this integration. Although the feature remains in its early stages, it aligns with the broader trend of centralized exchanges moving toward on-chain/off-chain convergence.
2. Building a Compliant Stablecoin Ecosystem with Traditional Finance — Tokenizing Fiat On-Chain
Following the establishment of an access gateway, Coinbase has partnered with Wall Street giants—including JPMorgan Chase—to pilot the issuance of compliant stablecoins and deposit tokens (e.g., JPMD) on Base. These assets are fully custodied by regulated banks and come with traditional financial benefits such as interest accrual, legal protections, and deposit insurance.
This initiative goes beyond simply putting USD on-chain—it represents the digitization of traditional financial system infrastructure, positioning Base as a core ledger layer for real-world finance in the Web3 ecosystem.
3. Building a Diverse On-Chain Ecosystem — Creating Real Use Cases for On-Chain Dollars
To strengthen actual demand for on-chain USD, Coinbase is simultaneously expanding the Base ecosystem with a wide array of applications:
On-Chain U.S. Stock Trading: Coinbase is seeking SEC approval to tokenize U.S. equities, planning to launch products that allow trading of Apple, Tesla, and other stocks directly on-chain—removing geographical barriers from traditional markets.
Collaboration with Circle: The launch of Circle Payments Network (CPN) provides USDC with robust clearing infrastructure. As the leading stablecoin on Base, USDC will support DeFi, RWA, and cross-border payment applications—positioning Base as a key hub for compliant blockchain finance.
Global Crypto Payments: Coinbase is working with Shopify and Stripe to integrate USDC into e-commerce checkout systems, expanding the real-world use of stablecoins in cross-border settlements.
Compliant DeFi and On-Chain Lending: Protocols such as Aerodrome, Uniswap, and Spark are being guided toward KYC-enabled, compliant operations, offering secure and auditable services in trading and lending for both institutions and retail users.
AI Agents and InfoFi Applications: New on-chain innovations like AI Agents and attention economy platforms (e.g., Kaito) are being explored to attract traditional users into emerging crypto-native interaction models.
Through this multi-layered strategy, Coinbase is not only building a regulated on-chain asset highway, but also constructing a value loop for USD stablecoins—from fiat onboarding and token issuance to liquidity, circulation, and real-world application.
High-Potential Projects in the Base Ecosystem
Aerodrome: As the flagship DEX on Base and a key partner in Coinbase’s integration plan, Aerodrome is well-positioned to benefit from stable institutional liquidity flows. This will likely boost trading volume, TVL, and protocol revenues. Holders of AERO tokens stand to gain from enhanced fee-sharing and staking yields, reinforcing user participation in governance.
Uniswap: Similarly, Uniswap—another DEX integrated by Coinbase—will gain increased on-chain liquidity and potential platform revenue, thereby enhancing the value proposition of its UNI token.
Keeta: A high-performance RWA-focused chain claiming millions of TPS and sub-second confirmation times. Backed by investors including former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Keeta has already validated its performance through independent stress testing. Despite significant token price corrections, it is expected to collaborate with Base on compliant RWA integration.
Creator Bid: In partnership with Kaito, Creator Bid launched version 2.0 with new features such as staking-based launches, increasing user engagement and expanding creator economy models. The platform’s BID token recently reached a historical market cap of $150 million, showing early signs of traction. Similar to Virtual’s early-stage momentum, Creator Bid is poised for continued growth as it iterates.
Upside: The first socially driven prediction market on Base. Users can tokenize X/Twitter posts, articles, and videos, and use USDC to vote and trade on them. Currently in its second test season with ~20,000 followers on X, the platform has not yet issued a token, but its unique blend of prediction and content mechanics gives it strong potential to become a liquid and narrative-rich application on Base.
Conclusion
Base is undergoing a transformation—from being merely a “high-activity trading L2” into a structurally complete financial and content infrastructure on-chain. From innovation-driven projects like Virtual and Kaito, to Coinbase's efforts in building a robust USD-denominated ecosystem, the narrative of Base is evolving.
While short-term hype cycles may cool and speculative behaviors persist, Base’s long-term strength lies in its consistent storytelling and institutional alignment. It is increasingly poised to serve as a bridge between traditional capital and Web3, making it not just a rotating narrative hotspot, but a vital reference point for tracking the crypto industry’s broader shift toward compliance, financialization, and utility.
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