optimism

10 Research published on platform X indicates that the current structure of the cryptocurrency market is changing. Altcoins overall remain relatively weak, while Bitcoin is in an oversold zone. However, at the same time, the market positions for crypto stocks and some selected altcoins are quietly shifting, with certain assets starting to outperform. Among them, Optimism (OP) is under pressure, with OP-USDT currently breaking below the 7-day and 30-day moving averages, showing a bearish technical outlook, and experiencing a decline of 24.4% over the past week.Additionally, the Base blockchain is gradually separating from the OP Stack, which means that the previous revenue-sharing partnership between the two has ended. Optimism has officially launched its first monthly token buyback plan, committing to use 50% of the remaining Superchain revenue to repurchase OP in the open market. The liquid staking protocol ether.fi has migrated all of its non-custodial operations to the OP mainnet to leverage its enterprise-grade scalability, providing some fundamental support for OP.

According to The Block, Coinbase's incubated Ethereum Layer 2 network Base has announced its separation from Optimism's Superchain ecosystem, shifting to a unified tech stack operated by Base, and abandoning external dependencies on OP Stack as well as Flashbots and Paradigm.This change aims to reduce the coordination overhead of maintaining code across multiple teams, simplifying the system through optimizations based on open-source components like Reth, while maintaining the "Stage 1" rollup status. It plans to be temporarily compatible with OP Stack, but future hard forks will require migration to the new Base client. The upcoming hard fork includes Base V1 (supporting Fusaka and switching to TEE/ZK proofs), and subsequent versions will synchronize with the Ethereum Glamsterdam upgrade; the blog emphasizes the protocol's openness and welcomes alternative implementations.

According to The Block, Coinbase's Ethereum Layer 2 network Base announced that it will no longer rely on Optimism's OP Stack and Superchain architecture, instead opting for a "unified stack" operated independently by Base.According to the official blog, Base will integrate core components that were previously scattered across multiple teams and code repositories (including key modules like the sequencer) into a unified codebase "base/base" to reduce coordination and maintenance costs, and to optimize deeply for its own needs.At the same time, Base will also reduce its external dependencies on Flashbots, Paradigm, and others. In terms of governance, Base will adjust the security committee structure, replacing the original Optimism-related seats with newly added independent signers.Despite the shift towards an autonomous technical architecture, Base stated that the protocol will remain open source and publicly standardized, welcoming third-party developers to create independent clients and maintain cross-upgrade compatibility. Base is currently the largest network in the OP Stack Superchain ecosystem.

According to tracking data from the Web3 asset data platform RootData X, in the past 7 days, the Ethereum L2 solution Optimism has been the project that X (Twitter) top figures have unfollowed the most. The new influential figures on X who have unfollowed this project include cryptocurrency trader Loomdart (@loomdart), NFT collector Gmoney (@gmoneynft), and 陳威廉 (@williamlab).In addition, the project that X top figures have unfollowed the most also includes OKX Wallet.

Before the release of the US CPI data, the volatility of BTC and ETH has weakened. Derivatives indicators show a marginal improvement in market sentiment. Although leverage levels have been significantly cleaned up, funding rates have turned positive, and institutional basis has rebounded, traders are still paying a premium for downside protection in the short term.Currently, Bitcoin may record its fourth consecutive weekly decline, marking the longest losing streak since mid-November last year. At the same time, the slowdown in trading activity and the decline in volatility are also suppressing overall trading volume. In the derivatives market, the proportion of call option trading volume in the Bitcoin options market has risen to 65%, but the implied volatility term structure remains in a short-term inverted state, indicating that traders are still paying a high "panic premium" for immediate downside protection.

Binance founder Zhao Changpeng (CZ) expressed confidence in the decision to convert the $1 billion SAFU fund into BTC, inviting everyone to verify the results together in the future. "I might be wrong, but I feel that in the end, this could be beneficial for the SAFU fund. Save this tweet for later."Today, the Binance SAFU fund address bought an additional 4,545 BTC, worth $304.58 million, completing the $1 billion Bitcoin purchase plan. It currently holds 15,000 BTC, and based on the price at the time of transfer to the fund address, Binance has spent a total of $1.03867 billion, with an average purchase price of approximately $69,245 per Bitcoin.

According to official news, the Optimism mainnet has added support for ERC-8004.The ERC-8004 standard enables a discovery mechanism and portable reputation, allowing AI agents to interact across different organizations, ensuring that reputation circulates everywhere, thus unlocking a global AI service interoperability market.

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently stated that the initial idea of using L2 as the main scaling engine for Ethereum is no longer reasonable, and he called for second-layer networks to evolve towards stronger specialization. This statement quickly prompted responses from mainstream L2 teams such as Arbitrum, Optimism, and Base.Vitalik pointed out that many L2s still rely on multi-signature bridges and have not fully inherited Ethereum's security; at the same time, with the increase in gas limits and the advancement of native Rollup solutions, the throughput capacity of the Ethereum mainnet itself is strengthening. Against this backdrop, the positioning of L2 needs to be rethought.Karl Floersch, co-founder of the Optimism Foundation, stated that he supports building a modular L2 that covers the entire decentralized spectrum, but also admitted that there are still real challenges such as long withdrawal periods, immature Stage 2 proof mechanisms, and insufficient cross-chain tools.Steven Goldfeder, co-founder of Offchain Labs, the developer of Arbitrum, emphasized that scaling remains the core value of L2. He believes that even if the Ethereum mainnet's capabilities improve, it will be difficult to replace L2's role in handling thousands of TPS during peak times, and warned that if Ethereum is unfriendly to Rollups, institutions may choose independent Layer 1s instead.Jesse Pollak, head of Base, stated that scaling Ethereum L1 is beneficial for the entire ecosystem, while agreeing that L2 cannot just be a cheaper version of Ethereum. He pointed out that Base is forming its own characteristics through application layer differentiation, account abstraction, and privacy features.Additionally, StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson hinted on social media that ZK-native L2s (such as Starknet) have, to some extent, aligned with the specialization direction proposed by Vitalik. Overall, L2 builders generally accept the trend of de-homogenization and repositioning, but there are still divergences on whether scaling remains a core mission.

According to Cointelegraph, after Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin commented that "the original vision of Layer 2 as the primary scaling engine is no longer applicable," several L2 builders responded, generally agreeing that Rollup needs to move beyond the positioning of "a cheaper Ethereum," but there are disagreements on whether scaling should still be its core role.Optimism co-founder Karl Floersch welcomed the challenge of building a modular L2 stack that supports "full-spectrum decentralization," while acknowledging that there are still major obstacles such as long withdrawal periods, second-stage proofs not being production-ready, and insufficient cross-chain application tools. He supports the native Rollup precompiled solutions emphasized by Buterin.Steven Goldfeder, co-founder of Arbitrum developer Offchain Labs, took a firmer stance, arguing that although the Rollup model has evolved, scaling remains the core value of L2. He pointed out that Arbitrum was not built as "a service of Ethereum," but because Ethereum provides a highly secure and low-cost settlement layer, making large-scale Rollups possible. He warned that if Ethereum is seen as hostile to Rollups, institutions might choose to launch independent Layer 1 chains instead of deploying on Ethereum.Base head Jesse Pollak stated that scaling Ethereum L1 is "a victory for the entire ecosystem," agreeing that L2 cannot just be "a cheaper Ethereum." He mentioned that Base is differentiating itself through applications, account abstraction, and privacy features, and is working towards decentralization in the second stage.StarkWare CEO Eli Ben-Sasson hinted that some ZK-native L2s (like Starknet) believe they already fit the specialized role described by Buterin. The entire Ethereum ecosystem is facing a roadmap adjustment: the base layer aims to enhance its capabilities, while L2 is repositioning itself as a dedicated environment serving different technical needs.

Optimism Governance announced that it will transfer 6,400 ETH between wallets later today. This operation aims to achieve liquid staking of the Optimism Collective treasury assets.According to the previously released Liquid Staking RFP, Optimism plans to allocate 40% (approximately 6,400) of its approximately 21,500 ETH treasury assets to liquid staking protocols on the OP Mainnet, while the remaining 60% of the assets will be used for native staking on the Ethereum mainnet.

The Ethereum Layer 2 network Optimism solution development team OP Labs has announced the launch of the enterprise-grade managed blockchain infrastructure OP Enterprise. It is reported that OP Enterprise will offer three service models: Fully Managed, Self Managed, and OP Mainnet, and will provide Mission-Critical Support to key partners, including Unichain operated by Uniswap Labs and Celo migrated to OP Stack.

Optimism launches the managed blockchain infrastructure OP Enterprise. OP Enterprise has three service tiers and can be deployed in 8-12 weeks: fully managed mode, self-managed mode (user-operated, with official support), and OP mainnet mode (starting from the public network, with the option to upgrade to a proprietary chain when the time is right). The official statement indicates that the team will be responsible for operations, security, and scalability.

The Optimism governance layer has passed a proposal to more closely tie the OP token to the economic performance of Superchain. This marks a significant shift in how token value and revenue usage are approached in one of Ethereum's largest Layer 2 ecosystems.According to the proposal, the Optimism Foundation will use 50% of the net revenue from the Superchain sequencer for regular buybacks of OP tokens during a 12-month pilot period starting in February. The remaining revenue will continue to support the ecosystem fund, finance projects, and operations.According to data from the Optimism on-chain governance portal, the proposal was approved with an 84.4% support rate after several days of discussion among representatives and token holders.This initiative is Optimism's first formal attempt to link the demand for OP tokens with the activities of the Superchain full network. Superchain is an ever-expanding collection of chains built on the OP Stack, including the OP mainnet, Base, Unichain, World Chain, Soneium, Ink, and more.

According to official news, Optimism has released the quantum-resistant roadmap for Superchain, with the core content announcing the gradual phasing out of externally owned accounts (EOA) based on ECDSA signatures over the next decade. The specific plan is that by January 2036, EOA transactions using ECDSA signatures on the OP mainnet and superchain will be deprecated, and all such accounts must delegate their key management to smart contract accounts that support post-quantum signatures.The roadmap covers both user and consensus levels. At the user level, account abstraction technology will be utilized, through standards like EIP - 7702, to gradually delegate signature authority from EOA to smart accounts capable of verifying post-quantum signatures. At the consensus level, L2 sequencers and batch submitters will migrate to post-quantum signatures, while also calling for Ethereum itself to establish a timeline to transition validators from BLS signatures and KZG commitments to post-quantum algorithms. The entire upgrade process will be coordinated through a hard fork, providing the ecosystem with a decade to achieve a smooth transition.

According to DL News, a proposal requiring the Optimism Foundation to use 50% of its Superchain network revenue each month to buy back OP governance tokens has opened for voting on Thursday. There are divisions within the DAO community regarding this. Opponents argue that using hard assets for buybacks is an inefficient use of capital, especially when the foundation still needs to net sell OP through grants and other means. Another major point of contention is that the buyback will be executed through over-the-counter transactions, which will not directly affect the public market price, and some representatives are concerned it may become a channel for insiders to unlock tokens.Supporters, on the other hand, believe that the buyback mechanism can clearly convey the value of network growth to the market and is the "right direction." As of now, the voting shows overwhelming support, with over 3.8 million votes in favor and about 19,000 votes against. Voting will end on January 28.

Ethereum L2 network Optimism stated that DAOs are facing challenges in fund allocation. The Optimism Foundation has proposed a plan aimed at more closely linking OP tokens with the success of Superchain.According to the proposal, starting from February of this year, 50% of Superchain's revenue will be used to buy back OP tokens. In addition, the Optimism Foundation will adjust its capital allocation methods to invest more effectively in the Superchain, enhancing the role of OP tokens within the Superchain.

According to CNBC, although the market may have had a rocky start in December, the trading engine still seems to have momentum, with hopes of reversing the turmoil of November. Bitcoin has recovered some of its recent losses, and tech stocks rose in U.S. trading on Tuesday, helping the stock market rebound from the previous day's pullback—one that interrupted a five-day streak of gains. This rebound indicates that investors' willingness to take on market risk has not disappeared; it just needed a moment to catch its breath.Other indicators also show that the market maintains sustained confidence in a year-end rally. According to the CME FedWatch, investors expect an 89.2% chance that the Federal Reserve will cut rates by a quarter percentage point at the upcoming meeting on December 10. This expectation has surged significantly compared to a month ago, when the likelihood was closer to a "fifty-fifty" chance.Doug Beath, a global equity strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, stated, "Barring any surprises, the market's attention is shifting back to fundamentals. It seems the market is focusing on better-than-expected earnings forecasts for the fourth quarter and the 2026 calendar year, while also looking beyond the current economic slowdown we are experiencing to anticipate a growth acceleration later next year." If investors are looking for a theme for the year-end rally, they may have finally found it: cautious optimism is striving to drown out the noise in the market.

According to Coinmarketcap data, the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization have all declined, with the following performances, top ten declines: Optimism (OP) down 19.55%, current price $0.3153; ether.fi (ETHFI) down 18.09%, current price $0.7231; Lido DAO (LDO) down 18.01%, current price $0.5973; Pudgy Penguins (PENGU) down 17.51%, current price $0.0103.Immutable (IMX) down 17.39%, current price $0.3114; NEAR Protocol (NEAR) down 17.24%, current price $1.89; Injective (INJ) down 17.21%, current price $5.51; Aptos (APT) down 17.15%, current price $2.47; Aerodrome Finance (AERO) down 16.96%, current price $0.6429; Cosmos (ATOM) down 16.81%, current price $2.53.