Coinbase’s Base Jumps Ship, Optimism Hits Rock Bottom – Again!

Ah, the sweet scent of financial panic! Optimism, that plucky little altcoin, has taken a nosedive into the Abyss of All-Time Lows, thanks to a spot of selling pressure that would make a Discworld troll blush. A 23% collapse in 24 hours? That’s not a dip-that’s a full-on pratfall into a pit of despair. And why, you ask? Well, Coinbase’s Base decided it’d rather build its own sandcastle than share Optimism’s bucket and spade. Off it trots, leaving OP in the dust like a forgotten sock in the drawer of blockchain dreams.

The news that Base is abandoning the Optimism OP Stack for its own unified tech stack was the crypto equivalent of a wizard losing his staff. Poof! There goes the ecosystem catalyst, and down goes the price faster than a dwarf with a hangover. Weak liquidity and sentiment as sour as a troll’s breath had already been weighing on the coin like a sack of rocks. This was just the cherry on the doom cake.

Whales: The Only Ones Still Swimming

Amidst the chaos, the whales-those great leviathans of the crypto sea-are scooping up OP tokens like they’re going out of fashion. Wallets holding between 1 million and 10 million OP have hoovered up 60 million tokens in the past month. At current prices, that’s a cool $8.43 million. Either they’re geniuses or they’ve got more optimism than a wizard with a spellbook full of fireballs. Still, with the broader market looking as cheerful as a vampire at a garlic convention, their efforts are about as effective as a banana peel in a sword fight.

Craving more of this crypto carnage? Sign up for Editor Harsh Notariya’s Daily Crypto Newsletter, where every day is a new adventure in financial mayhem!

Derivatives data? Oh, it’s a right old mess. The liquidation map looks like a battlefield after a particularly brutal game of Cripple Mr. Onion. Short exposure is through the roof, with traders betting on more downside like it’s a sure thing. $7.9 million in shorts? That’s not conviction-that’s a death wish. As long as these bears are in charge, any rally will be squashed flatter than a goblin under a cart wheel.

OP’s Journey to the Center of the Earth

Optimism is currently bobbing about at $0.143, having briefly kissed $0.140 like it was a long-lost lover. The breakdown is as dramatic as a Lancre witch’s curse, and the selling pressure hasn’t let up since Base said its goodbyes. Down 61% from its 2026 peak, OP is looking less like a coin and more like a cautionary tale.

Technical indicators? They’re about as cheerful as a dwarf with a toothache. If $0.140 doesn’t hold, the next stop is $0.119, and that’s a one-way ticket to Heartbreak Hotel for recent buyers. Still, there’s always hope-if the whales start splashing around enough, OP might just manage a rebound. Reclaiming $0.181 would be like a phoenix rising from the ashes, but let’s not hold our breath. This is crypto, after all-where hope and despair are two sides of the same coin.

Read More

2026-02-19 16:16