200 Million Gasless Transactions in One Month, Is Account Abstraction a Trend or a Bubble?

By: blockbeats|2025/03/22 06:30:04
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Original Article Title: The Real State of Gasless Web3
Original Article Author: Stacy Muur, Cryptocurrency Researcher
Original Article Translation: DeepSeek

Editor's Note: The article summarizes that within 30 days, 89 projects on 9 blockchains achieved over 2 million gasless transactions through ERC-4337 smart wallets, saving approximately $11,700 in gas fees, demonstrating the significant potential of the Paymaster payment model to enhance on-chain activity. However, the surge in transaction volume may mask the true user demand, as one-time activities such as NFT minting and airdrops lead to a short-term spike in wallet numbers but with low retention rates, while a few games, DeFi, and infrastructure apps show deeper levels of reuse. Data indicates that while Gas sponsorship can attract users, sustained engagement relies on attractive applications. ERC-4337 has driven the mainstream adoption of gasless transactions but faces technical complexity and cost challenges. The future EIP-7702 is expected to further simplify and expedite its adoption.

The following is the original content (slightly reorganized for better readability):

Within a mere 30 days, 89 projects on 9 blockchains facilitated over 2 million gasless transactions, saving up to $11,700 in gas fees.

The wave of gasless transactions across multiple chains indicates that solutions like those in ERC-4337 smart wallets, where fees are paid by Paymasters, can rapidly boost on-chain activity.

Paymaster-Driven Adoption May Mask True User Demand

· The surge in transaction volume may not necessarily reflect genuine user interest, especially when a small number of wallets (such as traders, bots) repeatedly call contracts.

· One-time airdrops, free minting, or claiming activities may lead to a short-term spike in wallet numbers, but subsequent usage rates are extremely low.

New wallet numbers for NFTs, games, and token projects have seen a surge, but many wallets are used only for one-off operations (such as minting or claiming rewards) rather than ongoing engagement.

On the other hand, a few applications have demonstrated deeper, repetitive usage, typically driven by more engaging game loops, repetitive DeFi actions, or infrastructure-level services.

These findings indicate that ERC-4337 smart wallets are reshaping on-chain activity, showcasing both the power of Gas sponsorship to attract users and the need for attractive, reusable applications to maintain user engagement.

@0xKofi has built an authoritative dashboard to track this explosive growth, with data provided by @base.

200 Million Gasless Transactions in One Month, Is Account Abstraction a Trend or a Bubble?

Key Metrics

· 89 unique apps/protocols

· Approximately 724,000 active smart wallets

· Approximately $11,700 waived in Gas fees

· Approximately 2,087,799 Gasless transactions

Development of ERC-4337

The rapid growth of Gasless transactions is part of a larger trend. In 2024, ERC-4337 accounts executed over 103 million User Operations (UserOps), more than 10 times the 8.3 million in 2023. 87% of these transactions had their fees paid by Paymasters, enabling a Gasless experience.

From the monthly Paymaster Gas expenditure chart, we can observe the following evolution:

· Early Adoption (2023): Little expenditure before mid-2023, with Optimism leading the early adoption.

· Growth Phase (Late 2023): By October 2023, monthly expenditure steadily increased to around $400,000.

· Peak Activity (April 2024): Expenditure surged to around $700,000, primarily driven by Base.

· Recent Trends (Late 2024 to Early 2025): After reaching a new high in November to December 2024 (around $630,000), monthly Gas expenditure has significantly dropped in early 2025, down to around $150,000 in February.

Through Paymaster, apps and users have spent over $3.4 million on UserOp fees, with main providers including @biconomy, @pimlicoHQ, @coinbase, and @Alchemy. Despite the market contraction, overall spending in the first quarter of 2025 shows a downward trend, with @base ($391,117), @ethereum ($121,053), and @BNBCHAIN (approximately $112,493) still leading.

On-Chain Activity Ranking

· Base (43.2%): Entertainment and Social Hub — Dominant in Gaming (76.8%).

· Polygon (21.4%): Community Engagement Layer — NFTs (50.7%) and Telegram Wallet (42.3%).

· Optimism (8.5%): Security-Focused — Emphasizing Infrastructure Resilience.

· Celo (7.4%): Niche Expertise — Forecasting Market.

· BSC (4.2%): Value Transfer Layer — Token-Focused, Highest Gas Costs.

Data Analysis

Before delving into data analysis, it is crucial to understand two key metrics:

· Tx/Wallet (Transactions per Wallet) — Measures the average number of transactions completed per wallet. A low value (e.g., ~1.0) indicates one-time usage activities (e.g., minting NFTs or claiming airdrops). A high value (e.g., ~25) indicates repeated engagement (e.g., active trading, gaming, or bot operations).

· Cost/Tx (Cost per Transaction) — Represents the average cost per transaction. In a Gasless system, it reflects the fee waived per transaction rather than the fee paid by the user.

1. NFT Projects: Numerous Wallets Usually = One-Time Accounts

· Piggybox: → Approximately 1 tx/wallet, ~$0.004/transaction.

· Somon Badge: → Approximately 1.4 tx/wallet, ~$0.007/transaction.

Interpretation: The 1:1 wallet-to-transaction ratio (Piggybox) strongly suggests minting or claiming activity. Piggybox is an NFT obtained during EARN'M registration, plus a lottery box that may yield EARNM tokens.

One-Time Surge: Many wallets engage in only one transaction (initial minting/claiming) and do not return thereafter, hence the near-perfect 1:1 ratio.

Ranking: Due to many new wallets engaging in minting, Piggybox ranks high on the overall leaderboard. However, if excluding one-time wallets, it might drop from the top five, indicating very low retention rates.

2. Token: Concentration of Token Transactions in a Few Projects

The list includes 26 token projects, far exceeding other categories. Two tokens, $BVRP and $USDC, accounted for over 667k transactions, representing the majority of the transaction volume.

· $BVRP: → ~25 tx/wallet at $0.012/tx.

· $USDC: → ~4.6 tx/wallet at $0.21/tx.

Interpretation:

· This concentration indicates that not all "token" projects are equally active; rather, a few heavyweight projects are driving the total volume.

· $BVRP demonstrates high transaction activity relative to the number of wallets, indicating high user engagement on these platforms, with frequent automated or repetitive transactions.

3. Gaming: One "Hit Game," but Attention Needed on Wallet/Transaction Ratio

 · @SuperChampsHQ: → Approximately 1.49 tx/wallet, ~$0.017/transaction.

 · @BLOCKLORDS: → Approximately 42 tx/wallet, ~$0.009/transaction.

 · @miracleplay_cn: → Approximately 14 tx/wallet, ~$0.012/transaction.

 Interpretation:

 · Super Champs dominate the overall gaming usage (463k vs. the sum of others at ~13k), but each wallet executes only about 1-2 transactions.

 · Blocklords has fewer wallet numbers but an extremely high transactions per wallet ratio (~42). This is often related to robot-driven repetitive operations, as Blocklords' David Johansson stated: "They are fighting robots."

4. Bridging and Plugins: Moderate but Stable Usage, High Gas Costs

 · UniversalX: → Approximately 4.4 tx/wallet, ~$0.55/transaction.

 · Safe4337Module: → Approximately 5.1 tx/wallet, ~$0.053/transaction.

Interpretation:

 · Behind-the-Scenes Tools: Infrastructure tools like bridges and plugins do not have the same "headline" transaction volume as tokens or games, but they maintain stable usage due to multiple dApp dependencies.

 · Ecosystem Health Metrics: The moderate usage of infrastructure services indicates their real utility, rather than hype-driven spikes.

5. Chain Specialization Is Emerging

 · @base: 99.5% of gaming wallet activity (310,934 out of 312,361 wallets).

 · @0xPolygon: Dominant in NFT/social activity (87% of ecosystem NFT wallets).

 · @BNBCHAIN: Leading in high-value bridge transactions (23.2% of all Gasless transactions).

 · @Celo: Strong performance in prediction markets (25,574 wallets, 12.7 tx/wallet).

6. Cross-Chain Cost Differences

A 100x cost difference between different chains is driving specific application categories to concentrate on particular chains:

· Ethereum: $2.41 per Gasless transaction (highest).

· BSC: $0.50 per Gasless transaction.

· Base: $0.02 per Gasless transaction (lowest among major chains).

· Polygon: $0.03 per Gasless transaction. Argument: A 100x cost structure difference between different chains will lead to specific application categories concentrating on particular chains, regardless of technical similarities. Games and social apps are economically unfeasible on high-cost chains.

Overall Situation

· NFT adoption may involve minting to tens of thousands of wallets at once (e.g., Piggybox), but the reuse rate is extremely low.

· Infrastructure (bridges, plugins) remains stable with moderate transaction volume, usually with high per-transaction costs (bridges) or stable off-chain usage (plugins).

· The differences in per-wallet transaction counts across all categories highlight distinct usage patterns: some highly repetitive, while others are purely one-off interactions.

· Finally, the engagement of a large number of projects is close to zero, indicating that relying solely on free Gas is insufficient to generate demand; dApps need a real value proposition to retain users.

Summary

Account abstraction and Gas sponsorship can indeed boost transaction volume and user onboarding, but the real test is repeat engagement. By combining wallet counts, waived Gas fees, and no-Gas transaction volumes, the data highlights the phenomenon of concentrated usage within each category, often stemming from one or two star dApps or large-scale one-time claim events. Projects like Piggybox demonstrate how a near 1:1 ratio of wallets to transactions can propel an NFT project to the top ranks but may quickly fall off after filtering out one-time accounts. Meanwhile, bridge and plugin solutions demonstrate more stable moderate transaction volumes, reflecting the ecosystem's true needs rather than transient hype.

The Role of the ERC-4337 Smart Wallet

All these trends—Gasless gaming, seamless DeFi, chain specialization—are driven by the ERC-4337 Smart Wallet.

Unlike traditional EOAs (Externally Owned Accounts), smart wallets introduce automation, security, and flexibility, significantly enhancing the user experience.

What Is an ERC-4337 Smart Wallet?

A smart contract wallet or smart wallet is a programmable Ethereum account that enhances the user experience through the following functionalities:

Batch Transactions—Users can batch multiple operations (e.g., approve + swap on a DEX) into a single transaction.

Gas Fee Abstraction—Users do not need to hold ETH to pay gas fees; the fees can be covered by a sponsor or paid with other tokens.

Security—Users can authenticate themselves through passwords, social recovery, or multi-factor authentication instead of using less secure seed phrases.

How Does Gasless Transaction Work?

When a user initiates a transaction, the Paymaster (a special type of smart contract) can step in to pay the Gas fee or allow the user to pay using any held ERC-20 token. This significantly lowers the barrier of entry for new users, making blockchain applications seamless like Web2 apps.

However, ERC-4337 also faces significant adoption challenges, with the aforementioned retention issues possibly stemming directly from the following key limitations:

· Technical Barriers: Complex components like UserOperations, Bundlers, and EntryPoint contracts pose a steep learning curve for regular users and developers.

· Cost Concerns: While Gasless transactions are beneficial for users, implementing the full stack may be costly, and the profitability of Bundlers is unstable during Gas fluctuations.

· Reliability Issues: Network congestion can lead to transaction delays, and complex validation logic introduces potential security vulnerabilities.

· User Experience Gap: Multi-chain fragmentation results in inconsistent wallet experiences, hindering seamless cross-chain management.

Conclusion

Account abstraction and Gas sponsorship have successfully boosted transaction volume and new wallet registrations, but the real challenge is sustained engagement. Data shows:

· Many dApps experience one-time spikes in usage (such as NFT minting, airdrops), rather than long-term retention.

· A few projects drive the majority of activity, while many others struggle to attract genuine user demand.

· Bridging and infrastructure solutions demonstrate more stable usage rates, highlighting real utility over hype.

While ERC-4337 has achieved Gasless transactions and improved user experience, its complexity and cost barriers limit mainstream adoption. EIP-7702 addresses these issues by:

· Allowing EOAs to engage in account abstraction: The core issue with ERC-4337 was excluding EOAs, requiring users to switch to a smart contract wallet. EIP-7702 resolves this by allowing EOAs to temporarily adopt smart contract code, enabling access to Gas sponsorship (paying fees with ERC-20 tokens) and batch transactions (such as approving and spending ERC-20 tokens in a single transaction).

· Simplify Complexity and Cost: Allow EOA to temporarily adopt smart contract functionality, reduce the need for permanent wallet contracts, lower Gas expenses, and decrease reliance on Entry Points or Bundlers.

· Improve Efficiency: Introduce transaction type 0x04 for batch EOA operations, providing a more streamlined alternative to ERC-4337 UserOps.

· Simplify Infrastructure: Restrict smart contract code to transaction execution, reducing reliance on alternative mempools and Bundlers.

· Empower Developers: Integrate with ERC-4337 and provide a flexible, low-friction upgrade path.

While ERC-4337 laid the foundation, EIP-7702 will make smart wallets cheaper, simpler, more accessible, accelerating the next wave of Web3 adoption.

Original Article Link

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Never Underestimate the Significance of the US Stablecoin 'Infrastructure Bill'

Original Title: "Never Underestimate the Significance of the US Stablecoin 'Genius Act'"Original Author: 0xTodd, Partner at Nothing Research


If the US stablecoin bill, the "GENIUS Act," passes smoothly this time, its significance will be tremendous. I even think it's significant enough to enter the top five in Crypto history.



Although abbreviated as the GENIUS Act, which translates directly to the Genius Act, it is actually the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins, which translates to "Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for US Dollar Stablecoins."


The proposal is lengthy, with several key points summarized for everyone:


· Mandatory 1:1 Full Asset Backing: Assets include cash, demand deposits, and short-term US Treasuries. At the same time, misappropriation and rehypothecation are strictly prohibited.


· High-Frequency Disclosure: Reserve reports must be published at least monthly, introducing external audits.


· Licensing Requirement: Once the circulating market cap of the issuer's stablecoin exceeds $100 billion, it must transition into the federal regulatory system within a specified timeframe, adopting banking-grade regulation.


· Introduction of Custody: The custodian of the stablecoin and its reserve assets must be a regulated qualified financial institution.


· Clear Definition as a Payment Medium: The bill explicitly defines stablecoin as a new type of payment medium, primarily regulated by the banking regulatory system, rather than restricted by the securities or commodities regulatory system.


· Embracing Existing Stablecoins: A maximum 18-month grace period after the bill's enactment, aimed at encouraging existing stablecoin issuers (such as USDT, USDC, etc.) to promptly obtain licenses or become compliant.


After finishing the main content, let's talk about the significance of this matter with an excited heart.


Over the years, when others asked, "After working in the Crypto industry for 16 years, what application have you created?"


In the future, you can confidently tell others—Stablecoins.


First, Clearing Concerns is a Prerequisite


Some people have held opposing views. In the past, people's impression of stablecoins was that they were an opaque black box. Every few months, there would be FUD — whether Tether's assets were frozen or Circle had a significant black hole deficit.


In fact, if you think about it, Tether easily rakes in billions of dollars a year just from the interest on those underlying government bonds. Circle, slightly less, also made a $1.7 billion profit last year.


They basically made money while standing there. From a motivational standpoint, they have no malicious intentions. In fact, they are the most eager for compliance.


Now, this opaque black box will become a transparent white box.


In the past, the only complaint was that Tether's funds might have been frozen by the United States. Now, they will be directly placed into U.S. compliant custodial institutions, with high-frequency disclosures, so you can rest assured.


【No need to worry about a rug pull】 is such a huge advantage—I think especially all Crypto people understand this.


Second, Mastering the Standard is Very Important


Stablecoins were once almost on the verge of being overtaken by CBDCs. In any country, if a central bank digital currency really exists, it is highly likely not built on a blockchain, at most it is built on some internal central bank consortium chain, which to be honest, is meaningless.


When CBDCs were at their peak, that was the most dangerous time for stablecoins.


If CBDCs had become a reality back then, stablecoins today would have been relentlessly suppressed into a dark corner, and blockchain would only be able to play a minimal role.


The remaining half-dead stablecoins would even have to learn the standards of central bank digital currencies, completely relinquishing their standard-setting power.


And now, stablecoins have won (or are about to).


Instead, everyone should learn the 【Blockchain + Token】 standard.


Nowadays, many blockchains actually have no meaningful applications on top, only stablecoin transfers. For example, with Aptos, the only scenario I use Aptos for is transfers between Binance and OKX.


And now, stablecoins will be legislated, what does that mean?


That's right, blockchain will become the only standard.


In the future, every stablecoin user will be the first to learn how to use a wallet.


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· Social Account Registration Wallet

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Stablecoins are a huge Trojan horse. The moment you start using stablecoins, you unwittingly step half a foot into the Crypto world.


Fourth, Conclusion


As a large reservoir for digesting US debt, although stablecoins cannot directly absorb debt, they at least provide ammunition for the US debt secondary market. These functions are quite important, and slowly, stablecoins are becoming a part of the US debt market's body. Therefore, once the US legislation is passed and experiences the benefits, there is no turning back.


And, we are also confident that stablecoins are indeed one of the great innovations in our industry. People who have used stablecoins will find it hard to return to the traditional cash-banking system.


Once the bill is passed, users can't go back. In the future, concerns are about to be resolved, standards will be mastered, and the era of large deposits seems to be on the horizon.


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$COIN Joins S&P 500, but Coinbase Isn't Celebrating

On May 13, S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that Coinbase would officially replace Discover Financial Services in the S&P 500 on May 19. While other companies like Block and MicroStrategy, closely tied to Bitcoin, were already part of the S&P 500, Coinbase became the first cryptocurrency exchange whose primary business is in the index. This also signifies that cryptocurrency is gradually moving from the fringes to the mainstream in the U.S.



On the day of the announcement, Coinbase's stock price surged by 23%, surpassing the $250 mark. However, just 3 days later, Coinbase was hit by two consecutive events: a hack where employees were bribed to steal customer data and a demand for a $20 million ransom, and an investigation by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) into the authenticity of its claim of having over 100 million "verified users" in its securities filings and marketing materials. These two events acted as mini-bombs, and at the time of writing, Coinbase's stock had already dropped by over 7.3%.


Coincidentally, Discover Financial Services, being replaced by Coinbase, can also be considered the "Coinbase" of the previous payment era. Discover is a U.S.-based digital banking and payment services company headquartered in Illinois, founded in 1960. Its payment network, Discover Network, is the fourth largest payment network apart from Visa, Mastercard, and American Express.


In April, after the approval of the acquisition of Discover by the sixth-largest U.S. bank, Capital One, this well-established digital banking company of over 60 years smoothly handed over its S&P 500 "seat" to this emerging cryptocurrency "bank." This unexpected coincidence also portrayed the handover between the new and old eras in Coinbase's entry into the S&P 500, resembling a relay race scene. However, this relay baton also brought Coinbase's accumulated "external troubles and internal strife" to a tipping point.


Side Effects of ETFs


Over the past decade, cryptocurrency exchanges have been the most stable "profit machines." They play a role in providing liquidity to the entire industry and rely on trading fees to sustain their operations. However, with the comprehensive rollout of ETF products in the U.S. market, this profit model is facing unprecedented challenges. As the leader in the "American stack," with over 80% of its business coming from the U.S., Coinbase is most affected by this.



Starting from the approval of Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETFs, traditional financial capital has significantly onboarded users and funds that originally belonged to exchanges in a more cost-effective, compliant, and transparent manner. The transaction fee revenue of cryptocurrency exchanges has started to decline, and this trend may further intensify in the coming months.


According to Coinbase's 2024 Q4 financial report, the platform's total trading revenue was $417 million, a 45% year-on-year decrease. The contribution of BTC and ETH's trading revenue dropped from 65% in the same period last year to less than 50%.


This decline is not a result of a decrease in market enthusiasm. In fact, since the approval of the Bitcoin ETF in January 2024, the inflow of BTC into the U.S. market has continued to reach new highs, with asset management giants like BlackRock and Fidelity rapidly expanding their management scale. Data shows that BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) alone has surpassed $17 billion in assets under management. As of mid-May 2025, the cumulative net inflow of 11 major institutional Bitcoin spot ETFs on the market has exceeded $41.5 billion, with a total net asset value of $1214.69 billion, accounting for approximately 5.91% of the total Bitcoin market capitalization.


Chart showing the trend of net outflows for Grayscale among the 11 institutions


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In other words, the more rational users are, the more likely they are to move from exchanges to ETF products, especially for investors aiming for long-term holdings.


According to multiple sources, several institutions, including VanEck and Grayscale, have submitted applications to the SEC for a Solana (SOL) ETF, with some institutions also planning to submit an XRP ETF proposal. Once approved, this may trigger a new round of fund migration. According to a report submitted by Coinbase to the SEC, as of April, the platform's trading revenue from XRP and Solana accounted for 18% and 10%, nearly one-third of the platform's fee revenue.



However, the Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs passed in 2024 also reduced the fees for these two tokens on Coinbase from 30% and 15% to 26% and 10%, respectively. If the SOL and XRP ETFs are approved, it will further undermine the core fee revenue of exchanges like Coinbase.


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Robinhood Takes a Stand, Traditional Brokerages Join the Fray


On May 12, 2025, SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins gave a keynote speech at the Tokenization and Cryptocurrency Working Group roundtable. The theme of his speech revolved around "It is a new day at the SEC," where he indicated that the SEC would not approach enforcement and regulation the same way as before but would instead pave the way for cryptocurrency assets in the U.S. market.



With signs of cryptocurrency compliance such as the SEC's "NEW DAY" declaration, an increasing number of traditional brokerages are attempting to enter the cryptocurrency industry. One of the most representative cases is the well-known U.S. brokerage Robinhood, which began expanding its crypto business in 2018. By the time of its IPO in 2021, Robinhood's crypto business revenue accounted for over 50% of the company, with a significant boost from the Dogecoin "moonshot" promoted by Musk.


In Q1 2025 earnings report, Robinhood showcased strong growth, especially in revenue from cryptocurrency and options trading. Fueled by Trump's Memecoin, cryptocurrency-related revenue reached $250 million, nearly doubling year-over-year. Consequently, Robinhood Gold subscription users reached 3.5 million, a 90% increase from the previous year, with the rapid growth of Robinhood Gold providing the company with a stable source of income.



Meanwhile, RobinHood is actively pursuing acquisitions in the cryptocurrency space. In 2024, it announced a $2 billion acquisition of the long-standing European cryptocurrency exchange Bitstamp. Additionally, Canada's largest cryptocurrency CEX, WonderFi, which recently went public on the Toronto Stock Exchange, also announced its integration with RobinHood Crypto. After obtaining virtual asset licenses in the UK, Canada, Singapore, and other markets, RobinHood has taken a proactive approach in the compliant cryptocurrency trading market.



Furthermore, an increasing number of brokerage firms are exploring the same path. Futu Securities, Tiger Brokers, and others are also dipping their toes into cryptocurrency trading, with some having applied for or obtained the VA license from the Hong Kong SFC. Although their user bases are currently small, traditional brokerages have a natural advantage in user trust, regulatory licenses, and low fee structures. This could pose a threat to native cryptocurrency platforms in the future.



User Data Breach: Is Coinbase Still Secure?


In April 2025, security researchers discovered that some Coinbase user data was leaked on the dark web. While the platform initially responded by attributing it to a "technical misinformation," it still raised concerns among users regarding its security and privacy protection. Just two days before Dow Jones Indexes announced Coinbase's addition to the S&P 500 Index, on May 11, 2025, Coinbase received an email from an unknown threat actor claiming to have obtained customer account information and internal documents, demanding a $20 million ransom to keep the data private. Subsequent investigations confirmed the data breach.


Cybercriminals obtained the data by bribing overseas customer service agents and support staff, mainly in "non-U.S. regions such as India." These agents abused their access to Coinbase's internal customer support system and stole customer data. As early as February this year, blockchain detective ZachXBT revealed on X platform that between December 2024 and January 2025, Coinbase users lost over $65 million to social engineering scams, with the actual amount potentially higher.


Among the victims was a well-known figure, 67-year-old Ed Suman, an established artist in the art world for nearly two decades, having been involved in the creation of artworks such as Jeff Koons' "Balloon Dog" sculpture. Earlier this year, he fell victim to an impersonation scam involving fake Coinbase customer support, resulting in a loss of over $2 million in cryptocurrency. ZachXBT critiqued Coinbase for its inadequate handling of such scams, noting that other major exchanges have not faced similar issues and recommending Coinbase to enhance its security measures.


Amidst a series of ongoing social engineering incidents, although there has not been any impact on user assets at the technical level so far, it has raised concerns among many retail and institutional investors. Especially institutions holding massive assets on Coinbase. Just considering the U.S. BTC ETF institutions, as of mid-May 2025, they collectively hold nearly 840,000 BTC, and 75% of these are custodied by Coinbase. If we price BTC at $100,000, this amount reaches a staggering $63 billion, which is equivalent to the nominal GDP of two Iceland in the year 2024.


Visualization: ChatGPT, Source: Farside


In addition, Coinbase Custody also serves over 300 institutional clients, including hedge funds, family offices, pension funds, and endowments. As of the Q1 2025 financial report, Coinbase's total assets under management (including institutional and retail clients) reached $404 billion. The specific amount of institutional custodied assets was not explicitly disclosed in the latest report, but it should still be over 50% based on the Q4 2024 report.


Visualization: ChatGPT


Once this security barrier is breached, not only could the rate of user attrition far exceed expectations, but more importantly, institutional trust in it would undermine the foundation of its business. Therefore, after a hacking event, Coinbase's stock price plummeted significantly.


CEXs are All in Self-Rescue Mode


Facing a decline in spot trading fee revenue, Coinbase is also accelerating its transformation, attempting to find growth opportunities in derivatives and emerging assets. Coinbase acquired a stake in the options platform Deribit at the end of 2024 and announced the official launch of perpetual contract products in 2025. This acquisition fills in Coinbase's gap in options trading and its relatively small global market share.



Deribit has a strong presence in non-U.S. markets, especially in Asia and Europe. The acquisition has enabled Coinbase to gain a dominant position in bitcoin and ethereum options trading on Deribit, accounting for approximately 80% of the global options trading volume, with daily trading volume remaining above $2 billion.


Meanwhile, 80-90% of Deribit's customer base consists of institutional investors, with their professionalism and liquidity in the Bitcoin and Ethereum options market highly favored by institutions. Coinbase's compliance advantage, coupled with its already robust institutional ecosystem, makes it even more suitable. By using institutions as an entry point, it can face the squeeze from giants like Binance and OKX in the derivatives market.



Facing a similar dilemma is Kraken, which is attempting to replicate Binance Futures' model in non-U.S. markets. Since the derivatives market relies more on professional users, fee rates are relatively higher and stickiness is stronger, making it a significant source of revenue for exchanges. In the first half of 2025, Kraken completed the acquisition of TradeStation Crypto and a futures exchange, aiming to build a complete derivatives trading ecosystem to hedge the risk of declining spot transaction fee income.


With the surge of Memecoin in 2024, Binance, OKX, and various CEX platforms began massively listing small-market-cap, highly volatile tokens to activate active trading users. Due to the wealth effect and trading activity of Memecoins, Coinbase was also forced to join the battle, successively listing popular tokens from the Solana ecosystem such as BOOK OF MEME and Dogwifhat. Although these coins are controversial, they are frequently traded, with fee rates several times higher than mainstream coins, serving as a "blood-boosting" method for spot trading.


However, due to its status as a publicly traded company, this practice is a riskier endeavor for Coinbase. Even in the current crypto-friendly environment, the SEC is still investigating whether tokens like SOL, ADA, and SAND constitute securities.


In addition to the forced transformation strategies carried out by the aforementioned CEXs, they are also starting to lay out RWAs and the most talked-about stablecoin payment fields, such as the PYUSD launched through a collaboration between Coinbase and Paypal, Coinbase's support for the Euro stablecoin EURC by Circle that complies with EU MiCA regulatory requirements, or the USD1 launched through a collaboration between Binance and WIFL. In the increasingly crowded trading field, many CEXs have shifted their focus from just the trading market to the application field.


The golden age of transaction fees has quietly ended, and the second half of the crypto exchange platform game has silently begun.


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After Surging 40%, Has Ethereum Price Peaked Upon Exiting the Craze?

Whether you are an insider or an outsider, these days you must be familiar with the news about Ethereum. The reason is simple, causing Ethereum enthusiasts to sigh with emotion and almost throwing off-guard those who defend Ethereum, Ethereum, with a "3-day surge of 40%," climbed to the top of the Douyin Hot List.



Where Does the Rally Come From?


As we all know, Ethereum launched the Pectra upgrade on May 7th. This most significant network upgrade since early 2024 integrates the Prague execution layer hard fork and the Electra consensus layer upgrade, significantly improving Ethereum's performance through 11 improvement proposals. The account abstraction feature (EIP-7702) allows users to flexibly manage wallets through social media accounts or multi-signature schemes, reducing the user threshold, attracting more users and developers. The staking mechanism optimization increases the validator ETH cap from 32ETH to 2048ETH and introduces a flexible withdrawal method, making it easier for institutions and individuals to participate in network security, enhancing the market's confidence in Ethereum's long-term value.


At the same time, Pectra optimized the interaction efficiency of Layer 2 networks such as Arbitrum and Optimism, making transactions faster and cheaper, leading to a surge in on-chain activity. As a crucial step for Ethereum's transition from "2G" to "5G," the Pectra upgrade not only enhances network vitality but also "recharges confidence" in the market, directly driving the price increase.



Related Reading: "Ethereum Skyrockets 22% in One Day, E Enthusiasts Rejoice"


It's not just Ethereum itself, as Wall Street also brought important bullish news.


The world's largest asset management company, BlackRock, proposed to the SEC allowing Ethereum ETFs for staking. This proposal is expected to elevate Ethereum ETFs from a mere investment tool to a bond-like "interest-bearing asset," bringing investors both capital appreciation and passive income, igniting market optimism about Ethereum's future potential.



Specifically, BlackRock has proposed to amend its S-1 filing to allow investors to create and redeem ETF shares directly with Ethereum instead of the U.S. dollar (i.e., in-kind redemption). This move, combined with its $2.9 billion BUIDL Fund launched in March 2024, aims to deepen the integration of traditional finance with blockchain. The BUIDL Fund is a tokenized fund operating on the Ethereum network, investing in traditional assets such as U.S. Treasury bonds. This setup is highly attractive to institutional investors, as they can not only benefit from Ethereum's price appreciation but also earn stable cash flow through staking.


Robert Mitchnick, BlackRock's Head of Digital Assets, stated in a CNBC interview in March 2025 that the addition of staking functionality will significantly enhance the appeal of the Ethereum ETF. He admitted that when the Ethereum spot ETF was launched in July 2024 without staking functionality, the market demand was lackluster, and staking could be the key to reversing this trend.


Meanwhile, the SEC's shifting stance on cryptocurrency regulation has also fueled this upward trend. During the tenure of the previous SEC chairman, the regulatory approach was tough, and staking was strictly viewed through the Howey test as a potential unregistered security. Therefore, when approving the Ethereum spot ETF in May 2024, staking functionality was explicitly prohibited.


However, with Trump back in the White House and Paul Atkins taking over the SEC, there has been a noticeable relaxation in crypto regulation. Apart from BlackRock, ETF issuers such as Invesco Galaxy, VanEck, WisdomTree, and 21Shares have also submitted applications for similar staking and in-kind redemption.


Related reading: "New Chairman Takes Office, SEC Transforms into 'Crypto Daddy' Within 48 Hours"


If staking ETFs are approved, the benefits are likely to go beyond price appreciation. The introduction of staking functionality could redefine the role of crypto assets, making them more similar to traditional financial products that provide returns and value appreciation, thereby driving Ethereum closer to mainstream finance.


Currently, the SEC still needs to address several decisions related to crypto ETFs, including whether to approve ETFs for Solana, XRP, Litecoin, and even Dogecoin. With the calls for an "altcoin season" growing louder, Ethereum's strong performance may just be the beginning of a larger crypto market frenzy.


In addition, the Trump family-related DeFi project WLFI is also bullish on this wave of rise, with frequent on-chain activities. According to on-chain data analyst @ai_9684xtpa's monitoring, a WLFI-related address is currently borrowing coins to go long on ETH, borrowing 4 million U from Aave to buy 1590 ETH at an average price of $2515 per ETH.


Has Ethereum's Price Peaked in This Wave?


For this epic surge of Ethereum after half a year of silence, the community has indeed gained more confidence and hope, which has also led to a revival of the entire altcoin market. However, amidst the joy, there are also voices of pessimism. Below is a summary conducted by BlockBeats based on community discussions.


The optimists point out that the current market structure is similar to the eve of the bull markets in 2016 and 2020, predicting a life-changing surge in the next 3-6 months, where some altcoins may even achieve astonishing single-day gains of up to 40%.


@liuwei16602825 stated that this surge signifies the return of the bull market as a sure thing. There is no need to worry about a pullback. The driving force behind the surge uses a high-cost isolated operation, fearing a drop more than any retail investor and will definitely do everything to support the price.


Related Reading: "Ethereum Leads the Surge Triggering the 'Altcoin Season' Speculation, How Do Traders View the Future Market?"


The bears mainly believe that this surge is different from the bull market of 2021, as the current market lacks the confidence of large-scale retail investors entering and holding positions for the long term, with funds rotating too quickly.


@market_beggar observed that a Bitfinex E/B whale has started to close positions and believes that if this whale maintains its high-speed position-closing operation for the next few days, it can be inferred that the whale no longer sees the upside potential of ETH, preparing to take profits and exit. The closing time will be a key focus going forward.



@FLS_OTC stated that there are still many uncertainties at the macro level, and the liquidity cannot support a major bull market. At this stage, it is a "last hurrah," not a complete reversal, and will continue to remain in a short position.


@off_thetarget believes that after ETH transitioned from POW to POS, it lost the "gold standard" of mining machine power cost support. The staking economic model led to a breakdown in value anchoring. Additionally, the L2 ecosystem (such as Starknet, zkSync, etc.) suffered from liquidity fragmentation, failing to establish an effective capital inflow mechanism, causing the collapse of the split disc pattern. Furthermore, the ETH community's excessive pursuit of technical narratives divorced from real-world needs resulted in a weak ecosystem growth. Therefore, he believes that ETH's intrinsic value system has crumbled, and the price is bound to plummet to the 800-1200 range, with a decisive short position at 1800.


@Airdrop_Guard, based on the core logic of the "High Probability Trading Strategy," where three sets of underlying logic different trading systems (such as volume depletion, price supply-demand, long/short position funding rate, etc.) simultaneously issue a short signal at the same point (2580), creating a high-probability trading opportunity. He emphasizes that these systems must be based on different algorithms and logics (rather than mere technical indicator overlays). The current ETH trend aligns with the short conditions in multiple independent dimensions of his trading system, hence the decision to short.


Overall, Bitcoin still maintains over 54% market dominance, and institutional funds' continued preference for it may limit the altcoin's upward potential. The market's future direction will depend on multiple factors, such as Bitcoin's price trend, global macroeconomic conditions, and whether funds can effectively rotate from Bitcoin to the altcoin sector.


Although Ethereum's recent leadership in the market has brought about optimistic sentiment, investors still need to remain rational as different sectors of altcoins are likely to show divergence in trends. Whether this round of Ethereum's rise will usher in a true altcoin frenzy may require more time and conducive conditions.


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