Base, the Coinbase-developed Ethereum layer-2 network, logged 943,277 daily active addresses on October 22, a 49.9% single-day increase that coincided with a GMGN trading competition requiring participants to use brand-new wallets. The same day, user-paid fees dropped 20% to roughly $91,059 and transactions fell 8.6% to 9.58 million.

The surge did not come out of nowhere. Active addresses had already jumped 82.5% to 629,142 by October 21, a 30-day high at the time.

Address count ran 167.6% above the prior week's median

Data from Growthepie showed the October 22 count was 167.6% above the median of the past seven days, which stood at 352,544. It was the highest reading in the 30 days since September 23.

Transactions, however, moved in the opposite direction. Growthepie recorded 10.49 million transactions on October 21 and 9.58 million the next day. BaseScan's daily export logged a matching dip, from roughly 10.53 million to 9.63 million, while user fees had risen to about $113,703 on October 21 ahead of the 20% slide. The divergence matters because fees reflect what users actually pay per transaction, so they gauge spending on blockspace rather than the number of distinct addresses that appear.

By October 23 the wave was fading. Active addresses slipped 38% to 584,540, though they remained 65.8% above the pre-surge median. Fees fell a further 19.8% to about $73,062, and transactions eased to 8.87 million. With the GMGN competition scheduled to end October 26, the pre-surge median of 352,544 gives readers a fixed benchmark for comparing daily address counts once the contest window closes.

GMGN's $20,000 track demands wallets with no trading history

GMGN, a token trading platform, unveiled its Base track on October 21, offering a $20,000 prize for the winner, with the competition running until October 26. "Trade Base coins and climb the leaderboard," GMGN wrote on X. Base promoted the track on October 22, posting about it the same day the surge peaked.

Under GMGN's rules, each entrant must register wallets with "no funds, no holdings and no trading history." Only trades executed through GMGN from the registered wallets count toward the leaderboard. Starting capital is capped at $2,000, and no one may enter more than once. Traders must create new addresses when they join, and Growthepie counts those addresses as new activity.

The rules also prohibit wash trading and coordinated trading between participants. Chain-wide totals, however, cannot show what percentage of the jump came from contest wallets.

Growthepie tracks all distinct "from" addresses that send transactions each day. The analytics firm warns that Sybil wallets can inflate active addresses during campaigns or airdrops and calls active addresses "one of the most contentious metrics." It also notes that one person can control many wallets and suggests reading wallet counts alongside chain revenue. On October 22 and 23, the fees users paid on Base declined.

Prior scrutiny of Base activity data

Doubts about Base's activity figures are not. Cryptopolitan reported on October 15 that Chainalysis had logged more than 138 million x402 transactions on Base, where x402 is a payment protocol that lets automated agents pay for services over HTTP. TRM Labs estimated that agents carried out only 0.6% to 7.5% of the x402 transactions it screened, while Artemis and a16z analysts said 48% of transactions and 81% of volume in December 2025 were gamed.