Control profile
- Transaction ordering
- Centralised — operated by Coinbase, a single regulated US entity
- Escape hatch
- OP-stack forced inclusion via L1. Mechanically available; economically unattractive for small positions.
- Upgrade authority
- Improved governance with longer timelocks and a larger security council, but admin keys can still upgrade bridge contracts within ~7 days.
- Liveness record
- Sequencer outages have occurred. Funds safe, access interrupted.
Ketju control assessment
Stage 1 with live fraud proofs and the best consumer UX of any L2 — cheap, fast, and the natural default for an embedded-wallet onboarding flow. That is exactly why it needs saying clearly: the sequencer is Coinbase. One identifiable, regulated, compellable US company orders every transaction. For a client whose thesis is “no single party can stop me,” routing them to Base because it is cheap quietly reintroduces the counterparty they were trying to leave — and it is the same failure as putting a sovereignty client into USDC. Fine for yield-first and tokenised-income. Not for sovereignty-first.
Observable review triggers
- Coinbase publicly censors or filters transactions at the sequencer
- Fraud proof system disabled or made permissioned
- Upgrade timelock shortened below 7 days
- Sequencer outage exceeding 6 hours
These triggers make the assessment monitorable. They are not predictions; each identifies a fact that would change or reopen the current control assessment.
Advisor implementation questions
- Does the client’s thesis require censorship resistance, or primarily low-cost settlement?
- Can the client exit without cooperation from the normal transaction-ordering party?
- Who can upgrade bridges or contracts, and what delay applies?
- Does the asset introduce an issuer weaker than the chain grade?
- What evidence will show a halt, censorship event, or governance change?