5 Investment Opps on Base

Dear Bankless Nation,

Base had its memecoin moment this weekend, but the Coinbase L2 is officially launching next week. There's still some action to be had ahead of its official launch for degens looking to get in early!

Today, we're surfacing 5 investment plays that could pay off if your Base bullishness is well-placed. Citizen's Only, thanks for subscribing!

- Bankless team

5 Fresh Plays on Coinbase's Base L2

Bankless Writer: Jack Inabinet | disclosures

L2 Summer has arrived and one of the hottest rollups on the block is set to launch soon: Coinbase’s “Base” rollup is fully opening on August 9th!

While many in crypto will not make the voyage until next Wednesday, bridges to Base are now open and the true pioneers are indeed making their way to the chain… Being early to opportunities in crypto is often the best way to make outsized profits and now is your chance to be early to Base!

Today, we’re helping you understand where the opportunity on Base may lie and walking you through five different investments you can make to express a bullish outlook on crypto’s hottest chain 👇👇👇

🚀 RocketSwap

Website | Twitter
Sector: Exchange
Market Cap: $910k
Ticker: RCKT

What is it?

RocketSwap was designed purely for one purpose: to service sh*tcoining activity on Base!

While the DEX has been live since Base’s inception, during the chain’s earliest days, RocketSwap initially found itself overshadowed by LeetSwap, a competitor that sadly suffered a 340 ETH exploit on July 31.

LeetSwap’s downfall proved to be a boon for business and RocketSwap is now the one of the top DEXs on Base! In the 24 hours prior to analysis, RocketSwap processed $21.3M in trades according to DEXScreener 🤯

The Play:

Undeniably, RocketSwap is putting up astronomical volumes! For the degen whose portfolio is desperate for a pick-and-shovel play in the emerging Base sh*tcoining ecosystem, RCKT is one of the cleanest routes for getting exposure.

Keep in mind, however, that substantial risk is associated with HODLing RCKT. There are neither guarantees that RocketSwap’s smart contracts are secure nor assurances that you won’t get dumped on if you purchase the token…

🧑‍🦲 BALD

Twitter
Sector: Sh*tcoin
Market Cap: $9M
Ticker: BALD

What is it?

Degens flooding into Base, after the chain’s bridge contract deployed, quickly coalesced on BALD as Base’s number one memecoin 📈

Initially, all was well and the token managed to amass a market cap of nearly $100M as hot money piled in! Disappointingly, on the second day post-launch, the token’s deployer pulled their liquidity from the BALD/WETH pair, a form of “rug pull” that succeeded in sending the price of BALD plummeting towards the zero bound.

Scorn for BALD was short-lived and the ticker soon received a renewed wave of attention. While some have speculated that the BALD deployer may be an early Alameda employee or SBF himself (!), these rumors appear mostly outlandish. The address has remained active, purchasing BALD in multiple transactions and redeploying a fraction of their liquidity to DEXs.

The Play:

Base’s earliest days have been filled with all manners of onchain shenanigans and BALD perfectly instantiates the chain’s degeneracy in token form! The ticker is a clear (some might argue funny?) reference to Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong’s absence of hair and the chaotic involvement of the BALD deployer adds on another layer of intrigue to the token.

There is some possibility that BALD HODLing could result in gains, but it is vital to remember that you are always someone else’s exit liquidity when trading sh*tcoins!

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🍣 SushiSwap

Website | Twitter
Sector: Exchange
Market Cap: $138M
Ticker: SUSHI

What is it?

SushiSwap is a DEX available across a variety of chains. It recently became the first well-established one to call Base home!

The Protocol better serves a longer tail of assets and blockchains compared to its main competitor, Uniswap. Sushi’s deployment to Base helps build out this overarching strategy and furthers an existing competitive advantage. Core SushiSwap products include the exchange and a cross-chain swap integration built with LayerZero’s technology that will likely offer future support for Base.

The play:

After the LeetSwap exploit, liquidity providers and traders on Base were sent scrambling for a trustworthy exchange solution; SushiSwap is well positioned to be this provider!

At the time of analysis, SushiSwap was one of the top DEXs on Base and had processed $28.0M in trading volume over the preceding 24 hours. This figure is substantially higher than Sushi’s Ethereum volumes! It is possible that the protocol’s early deployment to Base could help it secure an early mover advantage.

With protocol volumes dominated by Base activity, HODLing SUSHI is certainly a route to get exposure to the trading activity on Base! Additionally, if you are looking to earn fees from the speculative mania, I’d recommend providing liquidity through SushiSwap at this time, given the battle-hardened nature of the protocol’s smart contracts.

🧠 Synapse Protocol

Website | Twitter
Sector: Bridge
Market Cap: $112M
Ticker: SYN

What is it?

Synapse is a cross-chain liquidity network built to connect blockchains. Developers can create a variety of cross-chain applications on top of Synapse’s tooling, like cross-chain DEXs and yield aggregators.

The Synapse Bridge was the first product to be built on this communication network and one of the first reputable bridging protocols to deploy to Base. Anyone can use Synapse to seamlessly swap assets across Base and EVM or non-EVM chains in a safe and secure manner!

The Play:

Undoubtedly, the window to extract profits from a Base-dependant Synapse play is rapidly closing. With the Base launch just around the corner, the bridging landscape will only become increasingly competitive. Until this time however, Synapse is one of the few liquid tokens that will allow you to get exposure to Base bridging volumes!

🔵 Coinbase

Website | Twitter
Sector: Everything?
Market Cap: $21.6B
Ticker: COIN

What is it?

Coinbase is most widely known for its centralized exchange, but the firm offers a suite of products from liquid staking derivatives to prime brokerage services.

Base is Coinbase’s L2 and it’s built on the OP Stack, the same modular blockchain stack currently being utilized by many upcoming L2s. It will serve as the infrastructure layer servicing a variety of Coinbase-branded dApps.

With over 110M verified users and $130B in crypto held, Coinbase has more users and holds more assets than any blockchain. Onboarding even a tiny fraction of these users and assets onchain would be a massive success for crypto! Many anticipate that by directing users towards Base, Coinbase could kickstart the global adoption of decentralized financial systems.

The Play:

Degens have been busy aping memecoins and the Base sequencer has been working around the clock to order their transactions! Coinbase is the sole beneficiary of this income stream and earns revenue from each one.

While annualized sequencing fees currently represent under 1% of Coinbase’s 2022 revenue, this percentage should grow as Coinbase migrates users from its centralized exchange and towards the dApps it is developing.

Keeping an investment strategy simple can often yield dividends and the simplest way to get exposure to the investment is likely by buying COIN. Purchasing stock in Coinbase gives you exposure to both Base and all of the dApps Coinbase will be developing for it.

Action steps

• 🐸 Read last week's report on 8 Degen Investment Plays
• 👁️ Review the State of Ethereum Q2 2023 Report