Base-Solana: Business pragmatism or predatory capitalism in DeFi?

When Base launched the cross-chain bridge to Solana on December 4, 2025, it seemed like a logical integration step. The reality turned out to be more complicated. Within a few hours, key figures from the Solana ecosystem — including co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko — sharply criticized the bridge, seeing it not as cooperation but as a strategic takeover of value.

More Than Just Technology

The truth is, a bridge built on Chainlink CCIP and Coinbase infrastructure allows for direct asset transfers between networks. Applications like Aerodrome, Zora, or Virtuals could immediately integrate SOL and SPL tokens. Jesse Pollak from Base argued that this was mutually beneficial: Base needs access to Solana’s capital, and Solana applications should utilize Base’s liquidity. However, Vibhu Norby and other members of the Solana team challenged this narrative of pragmatic cross-ecosystem reinforcement.

Where Is the Real Problem?

The criticism wasn’t about the bridge itself but its asymmetry. Anatoly Yakovenko posed a key question: the bridge is “two-way on paper,” but is it at the level of actual capital flows? When Base attracts Solana assets, transaction fees, MEV, and staking revenues remain within the Layer 2 ecosystem. Solana loses everything — unless its native applications actually run on Solana and not just import tokens into Base contracts.

Akshay BD, a close collaborator of Solana Superteam, was even more direct: “Talking about two-way traffic doesn’t make it real. It’s a bridge between two economies, and the ultimate outcome depends on who manages it.” This observation hits the core of the dispute — not about technology, but about economic incentives.

Pragmatism or Masking?

Here lies a fundamental tension. Base, as an Ethereum Layer 2, must compete for users and activity. Presenting itself as a “neutral multi-chain infrastructure” is a clever marketing strategy. But for Solana, it means something different: downgrading from an independent ecosystem to a “liquidity provider for Base DeFi.”

Pollak maintains that over nine months of developing this bridge, Base asked Solana partners to engage, but “most projects weren’t interested.” In response to the accusations, he emphasized that projects have the right to use the infrastructure on the other side, which is natural pragmatism in the multichain world.

But Solana counters: there was no real collaboration with the Solana Foundation, no joint launch was planned, and no native Solana applications were prepared for migration. Instead, Base built the bridge to integrate applications from the Base ecosystem itself — which looks more like unilateral activity than a pragmatic partnership.

Economic Test

The true outcome will be revealed through capital flows. If over the next six months:

• Base applications start transacting on Solana, the bridge truly becomes two-way
• Native Solana projects deploy integration features that utilize Base, sharing revenues genuinely
• Solana capital remains one-way — flowing into Base but not back — Yakovenko’s thesis of value capture is confirmed

Competition or Cooperation?

The key question Yakovenko raises: does Base see Solana as an “equal partner,” or as a “resource provider”? The difference lies in whether Base actively encourages its developers to build on Solana or simply prompts Solana users to transfer assets to Base.

Pollak responds with pragmatism — each ecosystem has a different profile, and interoperability isn’t a zero-sum game. However, for Solana, the concern is real: a cross-chain bridge, without structural guarantees of value return, could be a competitive weapon disguised as a tool for cooperation.

The bridge is already live. Now, economics itself will speak.