Base has flipped the switch on a major token upgrade: the B20 native token standard is now live on mainnet, enabling developers and issuers to mint native stablecoins, tokenized equities, real-world assets (RWAs) and other fungible tokens without deploying separate ERC-20 contracts.
What just happened
- The B20 standard went live on Base at 18:00 UTC on July 8, 2026 as part of the wider Beryl upgrade, letting teams create tokens directly through Base’s protocol-level infrastructure rather than writing and auditing individual ERC-20 contracts.
- Base says B20 remains compatible with ERC-20 and supports ERC-2612 “permit” functionality, so existing wallets, exchanges and indexers should continue working without changes.
Key features for issuers
- Two token formats: an “asset” option (issuers can choose 6 or 18 decimal places) and a “stablecoin” option (fixed 6 decimals; issuer must specify a fiat denomination such as USD or EUR).
- Built-in issuer controls: minting and burning, pausing, transfer restrictions, supply caps, and transaction notes.
- Issuer Toolkit and role-based permissions with optional compliance tools, including freeze and seizure controls for regulated issuers.
Other Beryl changes
- The Beryl upgrade (which reached mainnet June 26 after a one-day delay tied to the B20 Activation Registry initialization) also shortened the standard withdrawal window from Base to Ethereum from seven days to five, and integrated Reth V2 to lower node storage needs and support higher block gas targets.
Context: recent outages
- The B20 launch comes less than two weeks after two sequencer-related outages. Base’s postmortem said the first incident on June 25 lasted about 116 minutes after an invalid block entered the sequencing pipeline. A second outage on June 26 lasted roughly 20 minutes and was caused by a race condition after a system reset.
- Base maintained those outages were unrelated to the Beryl upgrade and said user funds were safe. Founder Jesse Pollak acknowledged the interruptions were unacceptable for infrastructure intended to support global financial activity.
Why it matters
B20 moves key token issuance capabilities up into the protocol layer, lowering development and security overhead for issuers and potentially accelerating issuance of native stablecoins and tokenized RWAs on Base. Its ERC-20 compatibility and built-in compliance controls aim to strike a balance between developer convenience and regulatory readiness as Base positions itself for more mainstream financial use cases.
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