Base expands its blockchain and financial infrastructure
Base closed the latest week with activity spanning blockchain upgrades, tokenized equities, decentralized finance, stablecoins, payments and new applications.
The network's third major upgrade of 2026, Cobalt, is now live on mainnet, introducing Validity Transactions and enhancements to the B20 token standard. At the same time, Coinbase's tokenized stocks reached a new daily volume milestone on Base, while Aave V4's stock-backed lending market reached $9 million in deposits.
The week also brought new products from companies and protocols across payments, trading, lending, cross-border transfers and automated finance, further expanding the range of applications being built on Base.
Base Cobalt goes live on mainnet
Base Cobalt is now live on mainnet as the network's third upgrade of 2026. The release introduces Validity Transactions, allowing users to submit transactions with conditions that must be satisfied before the transaction can be included onchain.
The upgrade also brings enhancements to B20, Base's token standard used for tokenized assets. Base's Cobalt infrastructure supports conditional transaction flows in which execution can depend on factors such as current onchain state, storage conditions or defined block limits.
The upgrade arrives as Base continues building infrastructure around trading, payments and tokenized assets. Base's official platform now positions the network around embedded trading, asset tokenization, DeFi access and financial applications.
Base Batches 004 selects 10 teams
More than 750 teams applied for Base Batches 004, with 10 ultimately selected for the latest cohort. The selected projects are Bitrepo, Conta VC BR, Flovia, GreekDotFi, Get Grow, Mercatus AI, Renn Finance, Saturday Bank, Tribeca and Ledig Tech.
Base Batches 004 is designed for early-stage teams building products around areas including trading, payments, agents, financing and asset issuance. Selected teams receive an investment offer from the Base Ecosystem Fund along with an eight-week program focused on product development and fundraising.
The program is another part of Base's effort to attract companies building financial products directly onchain. The selected projects add to an ecosystem increasingly focused on practical applications rather than blockchain infrastructure alone.
Tokenized stocks gain traction on Base
Coinbase tokenized stocks recorded a new all-time daily volume of $100 million on Base, adding another milestone to the network's growing tokenized-equity market.
Base launched Coinbase Tokenized Stocks in August, bringing shares represented as B20 tokens onto the network. Base's tokenized-stock platform includes assets such as Apple, NVIDIA, Meta, Alphabet and other companies, with supported products available to eligible users outside the United States.
The week also saw 26 new tokenized stocks arrive on Base, including NTLXc and RDDTc. Meanwhile, Aave V4 stock-backed lending activity on Base reached $9 million in deposits, extending the use of tokenized equities beyond trading into decentralized lending.
DeFi activity continues to build
Base also saw several developments across its decentralized finance ecosystem. Beefy Finance crossed $20 million in total value locked on Base, while OUSD from OpenStandard launched with $10 million in liquidity.
Morpho added P2P Orders to Midnight on Base, giving counterparties the ability to establish loan terms and settle fixed-rate lending arrangements directly. Avant Protocol also launched on Base, bringing productive capital into Morpho lending markets.
Fluidkey introduced auto-earn on Base, routing incoming USDC into a Morpho vault curated by KPK. Jumper added carry-trade vaults for METAc, NVDAc, GOOGLc and AAPLc, while Veranta added 39 assets on Base, including 26 assets that had not previously been tradable onchain.
Payments and institutional infrastructure expand
Payments were another major theme during the week. Modveon launched Sivar on Base, allowing Salvadorans to send money between the United States and El Salvador.
Cloudflare also added its Monetization Gateway on Base, allowing APIs to charge agents on a per-request basis with USDC settlement. Coinbase partnered with Citi to bring stablecoin acceptance to Base, enabling institutions to accept stablecoin payments through regulated rails with automatic fiat settlement.
These developments broaden Base's use beyond trading and DeFi by connecting the network with payments, APIs and institutional financial infrastructure.
More trading and onchain applications launch
Several new applications expanded Base's trading and market infrastructure during the week. Catalyst Markets launched markets covering social interactions, listings, launches, news and onchain events.
NumoForex introduced a USDC-cNGN perpetual on Base for exposure to the Nigerian naira. Rift launched an execution API covering onchain routes including Base for swaps, bridges and deposits, while Hydrex introduced Hydropump for creating and trading new tokens.
Prediction and automated finance applications also expanded. Pred added NBA preseason markets on Base with zero fees for the season, while ForeverMoney AI brought TAO and subnet tokens to Base through Chainlink CCIP. O1 Exchange added tax tokens, and Jackson Denka shipped Spot, chart and audit updates on Azura ahead of its Atomic Execution release.
Base's ecosystem continues to diversify
Beyond financial applications, the network recorded several other ecosystem milestones. KOR Protocol reached 100,000 KOR ID mints on Base, while the latest episode of Powered by Base featured Bhaji, CEO of Centrifuge.
The combination of infrastructure upgrades, tokenized assets, lending markets, stablecoin payments and new applications shows how broad Base's ecosystem has become. Rather than relying on a single use case, activity is spreading across financial markets, enterprise infrastructure, payments, trading and decentralized applications.
With Cobalt now live and new projects continuing to launch, Base enters the week with a growing set of tools and applications built around onchain finance and programmable assets.
