The OP Mainnet, which is powered by the OP Stack, is currently the third-largest Ethereum Layer-2 by total value locked (TVL) at $1.84 billion, per L2beat<\/a>. <\/p>\n OP, Optimism\u2019s native token, is currently trading at around $0.14, down 26% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko data. The sell-off followed a Wednesday, Feb. 18, blog post from Base<\/a> \u2013 the Ethereum Layer-2 blockchain launched by Coinbase with a TVL of $3.8 billion \u2013 outlining plans to move away from Optimism\u2019s software over the coming months.<\/p>\n Experts told The Defiant this move matters because Base is the biggest network using Optimism\u2019s<\/a> technology. If Base steps away, it raises doubts about whether the Superchain can keep growing its shared revenue over time.<\/p>\n Optimism\u2019s Superchain Model<\/p>\n Under Optimism\u2019s Superchain model, chains that join agree to share a small portion of their fees with the Optimism Collective, according to an official Optimism blog post<\/a> from 2024. Specifically, each chain sends back either 2.5% of its chain revenue or 15% of its on-chain profits (after costs and gas fees), whichever is higher. <\/p>\n Because Base has been one of the busiest rollups, it was widely seen as one of the biggest contributors to this shared pool. <\/p>\n \u201cBase moving away from the OP Superchain isn\u2019t that surprising when you look at the incentives,\u201d said Shresth Agrawal, CEO of Pod Network. \u201cBase was reportedly contributing around 97% of the revenue, so at some point the \u2018Superchain tax\u2019 becomes hard to justify.\u201d<\/p>\n Nicolai Sondergaard, a research analyst at Nansen, told The Defiant that Base was processing roughly four times more transactions than Optimism, generating about 144 times more decentralized exchange (DEX) volume, and producing 80 times more gas fees. <\/p>\n \u201cThe ~26% crash in OP (now around $0.14) is the market repricing the whole Superchain thesis,\u201d Sondergaard added. \u201cIf Coinbase’s Base, the flagship OP Stack chain, is leaving to build their own stack, why would anyone else stay and share revenue?\u201d<\/p>\n However, Agrawal said that the broader issue, in his opinion, is licensing. \u201cThe OP Stack became the default L2 framework partly because it embraced open-source norms,\u201d Agrawal explained. \u201cBut fully permissive licenses make monetization difficult\u2014large, well-distributed players can fork or internalize the stack without long-term revenue sharing.\u201d<\/p>\n He pointed to alternatives such as business-style licenses (similar to Arbitrum\u2019s early approach), which he said may be harder to adopt at first but could prove more commercially sustainable.<\/p>\n \u201cMain Revenue Driver\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Oxytocin, head of ecosystem at Umia and a former Optimism governance delegate, explained to the Defiant that rollup partnerships like Base are integral to Optimism\u2019s long-term revenue narrative.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile this revenue would go directly to the Foundation as opposed to a token-controlled treasury, the value accrued through these kinds of deals with rollups was one of the main proposed revenue drivers,\u201d Oxytocin said. \u201cThe timing of this announcement will also impact the effectiveness of the recently proposed OP buyback scheme.\u201d<\/p>\n In January, the Optimism Foundation proposed<\/a> a buyback program that would use 50% of incoming Superchain revenue to purchase OP tokens starting sometime in February. The plan is meant to better align the token\u2019s value with the growth of the Superchain ecosystem.<\/p>\n Moving Forward<\/p>\n The Defiant reached out to Optimism for comment and was redirected to an X post<\/a> by Jing Wang, the CEO of OP Labs and Co-founder of Optimism. \u201cThis is a hit to near-term on-chain revenues,\u201d Wang wrote on Feb.18. \u201cBut as cryptotwitter has been saying for ages, we needed to evolve our biz model.\u201d<\/p>\n Wang added that the OP Stack remains the \u201cmost performant\u201d and has \u201cendured the most traffic in production,\u201d regardless of Base\u2019s fork. Data from DeFiLlama<\/a> shows that the TVL in Optimism Bridge is $498 million, down sharply from its peak of around $5 billion in 2024. <\/p>\n In an official statement, Optimism said it was \u201cgrateful\u201d for its three-year partnership with Base and that it will continue working with Base as an OP Enterprise customer \u201cwhile they build out their independent infrastructure.\u201d <\/p>\n![\"OP](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1771632249_982_image.png\"\/)
OP Chart<\/p>\n