Bitcoin has $BTC, Ethereum has $ETH, Solana has $SOL. These coins are not just traded on exchanges. They are built into the operation of the networks: they are used to pay for transactions, reward participants, and sometimes used as collateral for operations.
But a blockchain can be structured differently. Base works with $ETH instead of its own mandatory coin. Corporate networks can manage without a cryptocurrency at all. And in some applications, the user doesn't even see what technically pays for their transaction.
Why Pay for a Transaction at All
Any public network has a load limit. Every operation needs to be verified, included in a block, and its result saved.
If sending transactions could be free and unlimited, it would be cheaper to flood the network with junk requests. The fee makes such an attack more expensive: a million extra operations becomes a million paid operations.
Base specifically maintains a minimum transaction price even under low load. Among the reasons, the network itself cites spam protection. The documentation provides a calculation: with $ETH at $2000, the minimum base part of a typical operation is about $0.002. For a single user, this is an absolutely insignificant figure, but mass, meaningless spam turns it into a serious problem.
When there are more people wanting to conduct operations than fit in a block, the fee serves another function. Users start competing for limited space. The one who needs the transfer faster can pay more.
That is, the fee is not just earnings for network participants. It is also the price of access to a limited resource.
In Ethereum, the Coin Protects the Network
In the Ethereum network, $ETH is needed not only by users. To independently run a validator — a participant who confirms the state of the network — requires depositing at least 32 $ETH. The validator receives a reward for correct work, but the deposited coins simultaneously become collateral.
For a typical connection failure, there are small penalties. For serious violations, for example, confirming conflicting versions of the chain, part of the collateral is destroyed, and the validator is excluded from work.
The size of the losses depends on the scale of the violation. If many validators violate the rules simultaneously, the penalty increases sharply and, in a major attack, can affect their entire accounted collateral.
The meaning is simple: by violating the network's rules, the participant risks their own $ETH. The coin here becomes part of the security system. If you remove this collateral, you would have to come up with another way to make an attack expensive.
Who Pays Those Who Maintain the Network
A public network operates thanks to independent participants who are not employees of a single company. Miners and validators still need to pay for equipment, internet, and electricity.
Bitcoin settles with miners in $BTC. For a found block, the miner receives new coins and user fees. After the 2024 halving, the new reward portion is 3.125 $BTC per block. Bitcoin's network rules cut this amount in half every 210,000 blocks — about every four years.
This allows the network to pay participants automatically. There is no company that has to sign a contract with each miner and transfer dollars from a bank account.
In Solana, fees are paid in $SOL. The base rate is 5000 lamports — the smallest parts of a $SOL — per transaction signature. Under high load, a user can additionally pay for higher operation priority.
$SOL is also used in staking: owners transfer coins to validators who maintain the network, and the reward is distributed among participants. In such systems, the coin is not an external financial instrument. It is built into the payment of the infrastructure itself.
A Blockchain Can Work Without Cryptocurrency Altogether
Consider another example. The blockchain platform Hyperledger Fabric is used for private networks where participants are known in advance. Such a ledger can be maintained jointly by banks, logistics companies, or manufacturers.
Each organization receives a digital identity, and rules define who is allowed to send operations, read data, or manage the system. This blockchain allows operation without its own cryptocurrency. There is no need to pay for mining with a token or buy a coin to run programs within the network.
The reason lies in a different trust model. If an unknown person attacks the Ethereum network, they can't simply be removed from the client list: there is no such list. In a corporate network, participants are known. A violator can be identified, their rights restricted, or contract terms applied.
Companies can also share server costs via ordinary payments. It's still a blockchain. Just economic incentives are replaced by an access system and agreements between known participants.
Base Works Without Its Own Mandatory Coin
Base is a public network built on Ethereum. Users can freely launch applications there and transfer assets, but they pay the fee in $ETH. A separate Base token for conducting ordinary operations has not been required by it so far.
When the network launched in 2023, the team said that issuing its own token was not needed. Only in September 2025 did Base first announce that it had begun studying such a possibility. At the same time, no timeline or structure for a future coin was announced.
The example itself is telling: a public blockchain can work for several years, develop applications, and serve users without its own mandatory cryptocurrency. It needs a way to pay for the network's operation, but for that, it's not necessary to issue a new asset. Base uses the already existing $ETH.
The User May Not Need the $SOL Token at All
Even when the coin is necessary for the network itself, the end user is not always obliged to hold it. In Solana, every transaction is ultimately paid for in $SOL. But the application or another account can pay.
For example, a person receives 100 $USDC in a new wallet. They have no $SOL. In the typical scheme, they wouldn't be able to send these 100 $USDC further: first, they'd need to acquire a little $SOL for the fee somewhere.
Solana allows designating another account as the payer. The user confirms sending their $USDC, and the application separately pays the network fee. There is also a ready-made service, Kora. It can pay the fee for the client or accept another token from them, for example $USDC, and settle with Solana itself in $SOL.
For the network, nothing changed: it received the necessary $SOL. But the person no longer needs to buy a second coin just for one transfer.
How This Looks in a Regular Wallet
The Celo blockchain allows it to be even simpler: the fee can be paid directly with supported stablecoins, including $USDC and $USDT, instead of the main coin $CELO. That is, a user can receive $USDC and pay for sending funds with the same $USDC. There's no need to separately search for $CELO.
This scheme works in MiniPay — a mobile wallet that supports USDm, $USDT, and $USDC. MiniPay manages the conversion of the user's stablecoin on its own. For a person, this looks almost like a regular payment application. The account holds digital dollars, and they can be used. The technical economics of the blockchain doesn't disappear. It's just hidden from the user.
How to Understand If a Network Really Needs a Token
Ethereum, Bitcoin, Base, and Hyperledger show four different models.
If you remove $ETH from Ethereum, the validator collateral disappears, and you'd have to rebuild the economic security system from scratch. If you remove $BTC from Bitcoin, there would be nothing to automatically reward miners with under current rules. Base already works without its own coin, using $ETH. Hyperledger Fabric shows that in a closed network, a market token may not be needed at all.
Therefore, when evaluating a new cryptocurrency, it's worth asking one question: what exactly would stop working if you remove this token? If without it, fees, participant rewards, or network protection disappear, the coin is built into the core mechanics of the blockchain.
If the network continues to work almost the same, and the token is used mainly for voting, discounts, or other additional functions, its connection to the infrastructure itself is much weaker.
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