This week, the Ethereum ecosystem was rocked by a $654 million ETH switch by the Ethereum Basis. This started intense scrutiny of developer pay, transparency, and management, resulting in the general public resignation of core developer Péter Szilágyi and new criticism of governance practices.
On the identical time, Polygon's AggLayer upgrades are experiencing startup delays and community instability, intensifying debate over Layer 2 alignment, fragmentation, and Basis help for exterior L2.
These developments, together with the instability of the POL token transition, the continued wrestle to steadiness mainnet centralization and L2 sovereignty, and reactions to the Basis's earlier management reorganization, add new urgency to the talk over Ethereum's future route and the sustainable development of its scaling ecosystem.
Ethereum household feud
A couple of weeks after Polygon founder Sandeep Nailwal took over as CEO of the Polygon Basis and warned of Ethereum’s “existential” Layer 2 (L2) route, Ethereum’s scaling structure took a flip from a technical sidebar to a political-economic one when Vitalik Buterin praised Coinbase’s Base for “doing issues the fitting means.”
The query that emerges from the competing visions is whether or not Ethereum will standardize the way in which L2 captures and settles worth, or whether or not we are going to see liquidity fragment into parallel techniques that bypass the mainnet.
This rigidity crystallized by means of three developments in mid-2025. Nailwal took over management of Polygon Basis on June 11 amid a strategic reset, positioning the community as extra impartial from Ethereum's rollup-centric custom.
Polygon shipped AggLayer v0.3 on June twenty third, advancing chain-agnostic interoperability with PoS. PoS was anticipated to be linked by the top of the third quarter, however that had not occurred on the time of this text.
Buterin's public endorsement of Base in September reignited the talk over whether or not Ethereum's management helps a specific L2, amplifying earlier frictions as Nailwal questioned the shortage of visibility from Ethereum's core builders and warned that anti-L2 sentiment may destroy the ecosystem's social material.
In accordance with L2BEAT information, Arbitrum and Base account for the biggest share of worth secured on Ethereum Layer 2, adopted by OP Mainnet and Linea.
Polygon zkEVM stays considerably smaller than proof-of-stake chains, each when it comes to complete worth locked and transaction exercise.
The Dune Sequencer Revenue Dashboard reveals that Base and Arbitrum generate the vast majority of web sequencer revenue much less layer 1 information prices, with Base persistently rating as the highest revenue generator by means of the top of 2025.
Buterin's 2025 roadmap commentary focuses on simplification, mainnet resiliency, together with improved privateness, and a Layer 2 consumer expertise that depends closely on Layer 1 safety ensures.
This steering establishes alignment with what Ethereum management considers “good L2 citizenship”: proof of professional fraud or legitimacy, reliance on Ethereum for information availability, and new requirements for gentle shoppers and shared sequences.
Polygon's AggLayer pursues chain-agnostic shared liquidity, putting the community adjoining slightly than inside Ethereum's rollup custom.
Its Proof-of-Stake chain is transferring to a zkEVM validium integration that leverages another information availability layer.
Three paths to payment acquisition and market construction
The following 6-12 months will check whether or not Ethereum can standardize the circulate of worth throughout competing layer 2 architectures.
With a 50% to 60% probability of a gentle adjustment state of affairs, Ethereum mainnet will earn 25% to 40% of complete layer 2 payment income as prices stabilize attributable to blob compression and improved information availability.
Base and Arbitrum retain 60% to 70% of Layer 2's web income, and the prevalence of the OP stack maintains Base's distribution benefit by means of Coinbase's on-ramp infrastructure.
Polygon’s AggLayer connects the Proof-of-Stake ecosystem with the CDK chain to drive elevated cross-chain liquidity. Nonetheless, Ethereum native transaction flows favor OP stack clusters with formal cost ensures.
The efficiency of POL tokens on this state of affairs is dependent upon the breadth of the ecosystem slightly than rolled up legitimacy credentials.
In a fragmentation state of affairs with a chance of 20% to 25%, OP stack standardization and cross-rollup bridging will cut back friction for customers transferring property between chains, and Ethereum mainnet will see over 70% of layer 2 revenue share.
Polygon strengthens Ethereum alignment by means of ZK Proof and Ethereum>OP, POL derives its narrative from web sequencer profitability, will increase sensitivity to month-to-month revenue leaderboards that point out Base, operates with out native tokens, and units consumer expertise requirements that stress tokenized rollups to justify their worth by means of income sharing, subsidies, or governance rights.
Polygon's funding case improves if AggLayer drives composability that interprets into liquidity retention slightly than ephemeral bridging quantity, no matter its rating as the biggest pure rollup by conventional definition.
Monitoring AggLayer connection milestones and Proof-of-Stake migration progress offers a number one indicator for this state of affairs.
Builders optimizing distribution are confronted with an actual calculation that their OP stack and base infrastructure will achieve short-term consumer acquisition by means of streamlined on-ramps and L2-to-L2 liquidity routing.
Groups that prioritize consumer expertise and cross-chain operability are prone to carry out higher than groups that concentrate on doctrinal alignment discussions, particularly as multi-chain consumer expertise stays a problem and community results favor the biggest distribution hubs.
Centralization and interoperability as structural forces
Coinbase's Base's public acclaim from Buterin has sharpened the talk over company affect and Ethereum's social construction, particularly as international regulatory frameworks, together with MiCA and FATF steering, favor a KYC-friendly L2 with a transparent operator.
Polygon's chain-agnostic AggLayer imaginative and prescient competes with OP superchains and ZK rollup hubs in an interoperability arms race akin to the cell platform race, the place walled gardens distinction with open fluidity meshes.
Ethereum's mainnet is positioned as a basic infrastructure slightly than an unique cost layer.
Person gravity is targeted on networks that resolve multi-chain ache factors, with Vitalik and Ethereum core researchers driving a simplified Layer 1-secured L2 consumer expertise.
As consumer expertise requirements unify round a standard gentle shopper implementation and proof verification, community results will carry additional advantages to the biggest distribution hubs, together with Base and Arbitrum.
The Polygon various will rely on AggLayer establishing sufficient cross-chain liquidity to permit builders and customers to decide on composability over formal Ethereum funds.
The end result will decide whether or not Ethereum operates as a standardized funds layer that derives predictable charges from coordinated rollups, or as one choice in a competing structure the place liquidity and customers are distributed throughout networks with various levels of mainnet dependence.
Sequencer revenue focus, blob utilization, and AggLayer adoption metrics by mid-2026 will reveal which path the ecosystem will take and whether or not loyalty to Ethereum will change into a measurable financial parameter slightly than a social layer assumption.
