Výzkumník John Nakamoto označil za hlavní problém Cardana propast mezi tržní hodnotou 10,2 mld. USD a 71 mil. USD v celkové uzamčené hodnotě (TVL) v DeFi.
Crypto researcher John Nakamoto says Cardano (ADA) main problem is not its technology, but its ability to turn its high market value into real-world network use.
He made this point on X after examining Cardano’s performance since ADA became the third-largest cryptocurrency by market value in 2021.
On September 3, 2021, ADA was worth about $2.97, giving Cardano a market value of around $95 billion, according to Nakamoto. ADA later rose above $3 before beginning a long decline.
Since its peak, ADA price has lost more than 92% of its value. This has led some people to call Cardano “dead.”
However, Nakamoto says that view misses the real problem facing the blockchain.
Cardano Value vs. Network Usage Nakamoto says a massive gap exists between Cardano’s market value and how much the network is actually used.
He pointed to a market value of about $10.2 billion, compared with only about $71 million locked in Cardano’s DeFi ecosystem. In other words, Cardano’s market value is around 144 times larger than the money in use in its DeFi system.
He also noted that Cardano has about $67 million in stablecoins, around $4.4 million in daily DEX trading volume, and roughly 16,000 daily active addresses.
For Nakamoto, these numbers expose Cardano’s biggest challenge of turning its high valuation into real usage.
He believes Cardano’s technology is strong, but investors ultimately want to see more users, money, apps and activity on the network.
USDCx Brings More Money to Cardano Nakamoto believes USDCx can help solve Cardano’s liquidity problem. USDCx is backed 1:1 by USDC and gives users access to dollar-based liquidity on the Cardano network. This makes it easier for money to move into Cardano without relying heavily on third-party bridges.
Nakamoto also pointed to Cardano’s recent network upgrades and governance changes.
The Van Rossem hard fork was an important step because the Cardano community proposed, discussed and approved it through the network’s governance system.
He also highlighted Leios, a project designed to help Cardano handle many more transactions. One part of Leios, called Input Endorsers, increases network capacity by 10 to 65 times. The technology remains under development and has not been fully deployed.
Cardano Treasury Is a Major Advantage Nakamoto also believes Cardano’s treasury can become a major advantage. ADA holders participate in governance through representatives, while stake pool operators and the Constitutional Committee also help make decisions.
Nakamoto estimates that Cardano’s treasury holds around 1.4 billion ADA. Meanwhile, a large treasury does not automatically make the network more valuable. What matters is how that money is used.
The market wants to see the treasury bring in more users, liquidity, DeFi activity, transactions, fees, and applications.
Privacy and Real-World Uses Nakamoto says privacy is becoming an important part of Cardano’s future. He pointed to Midnight, a Cardano partner project focused on protecting private data, along with its NIGHT token. Privacy is becoming increasingly important as people and businesses look for ways to keep sensitive information safe while using blockchain technology.
Nakamoto also highlighted Cardano’s work with Petrobras, a Brazilian energy company. Petrobras is using Cardano to record and verify information about sustainable aviation fuel and renewable diesel.
This gives Cardano a real-world use beyond simply buying and selling cryptocurrency.
CIP-113 Helps with Real-World Assets Nakamoto also mentioned CIP-113, which helps Cardano with the tokenization of real-world assets. The proposal lets developers build rules directly into tokens. These rules include KYC checks, approved-user lists, transfer limits, freezing features and location restrictions.
CIP-113 does not automatically make Cardano legally compliant. Instead, it gives developers tools to build certain regulatory requirements directly into token transfers.
This is useful for stablecoins, tokenized securities and other real-world assets.
ADA Remains Important to Robinhood Nakamoto also noted that ADA was included in Robinhood’s initial list of cryptocurrencies for its planned perpetual futures product for eligible U.S. customers. The list includes Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Solana (SOL), XRP, Dogecoin (DOGE), Cardano (ADA), Chainlink (LINK), and Hyperliquid (HYPE).
According to Nakamoto, ADA contracts offer up to 3x leverage and have no expiration date.
He said this does not prove Cardano is a DeFi leader. However, it shows that ADA still has enough market interest and liquidity to be included among the major assets.
Cardano Biggest Challenge Is Adoption In sum, Nakamoto rejects the idea that Cardano is “dead.” He urges investors to focus on how much people actually use the network.
The main problem is the enormous gap between Cardano’s market value and its real economic activity.
Cardano is worth far more in the market than the money currently in its DeFi ecosystem. Nakamoto believes this gap needs to shrink.
For ADA holders, growing the ecosystem is just as important as improving the technology.
Cardano has the technology, treasury, governance structure and infrastructure to build a larger ecosystem. The next step is converting those strengths into users, liquidity, applications, DeFi activity and real-world projects.
Cardano (ADA) po dřívějším 4% růstu v týdnu vzrostlo nad 0,270 USD; otevřený zájem na futures dosáhl 695,71 milionu USD. Klíčová rezistence se nachází na úrovni 0,299 USD.
Cardano (ADA) topped $0.270 on Tuesday, extending gains after a 4% rally earlier in the week and pushing the token above its major daily moving averages. Market participants noted increasing derivatives activity, echoing renewed investor interest in ADA as the network prepared for a key ecosystem event.
Node diversity event draws focus to decentralizationAttention within the Cardano community centered on Tuesday’s Node Diversity Celebration Day in Singapore, held as a precursor to the TOKEN2049 conference. The event brought together contributors and developers involved in expanding Cardano’s node ecosystem, which is essential to the blockchain’s decentralization and resilience.
Cardano, a proof-of-stake blockchain established by Input Output Global and known for prioritizing scalability and interoperability, uses a decentralized network of nodes to validate transactions and maintain security.
The workshop ran for three hours, featuring development updates and outlining timelines for new, independent node implementations. Organizers emphasized that diversifying node software is designed to strengthen network resilience against failures and attacks, with further phases aimed at long-term decentralization.
Participants said the event served as a status check on ongoing initiatives rather than marking full completion. For investors, progress in node diversity is often seen as a factor that can boost confidence in the network’s future, although much depends on the delivery and adoption of proposed improvements.
Mini dictionary: Node diversity, in blockchain, refers to the use of multiple, independently developed node software clients on a single network. This approach enhances resilience by reducing reliance on a single codebase, lowering risks from bugs and security flaws.
ADA’s price action received additional support from derivatives markets. Data from CoinGlass indicated that ADA futures open interest reached $695.71 million on Tuesday, nearing the September peak after steady growth since early October.
MetricValueReferencePrice$0.270TuesdayFutures open interest$695.71 millionNear September highsFunding rate0.010%TuesdayKey resistance$0.299Upside targetInitial support$0.245DownsideThe funding rate for ADA perpetual futures entered positive territory, moving up to 0.010% on Tuesday. Positive funding occurs when traders with long positions pay those with shorts, indicating stronger appetite for upward price movement. However, rising leverage can also increase price volatility.
Technical outlook: ADA tests resistance after strong rallyOn technical charts, ADA continues to trade above its 50-day, 100-day, and 200-day exponential moving averages, signaling a continued bullish outlook. Momentum indicators remain strong, although some suggest the current rally could be approaching short-term exhaustion.
The Relative Strength Index (RSI) for ADA stands at 71, marking entry into the overbought range and indicating that upside momentum is stretched. Meanwhile, the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) is still positive, reinforcing buyer enthusiasm.
Analysts caution that while indicators remain favorable, a period of consolidation or a brief correction could develop as ADA tests the next resistance zone. The key hurdle is located near $0.299, just below the psychologically significant $0.300 level.
ADA is currently in a constructive uptrend, but both funding data and technicals show that any sustained rally from here will require fresh demand, especially as the token approaches major resistance levels.
Should ADA break and close above this resistance on a daily basis, analysts see potential for the uptrend to extend further. However, if the token fails to overcome this barrier, a retracement toward initial support at $0.245 could follow, with further cushions at the 200-day EMA near $0.240 and $0.236.
Additional support is marked by the 50-day EMA at $0.226 and the 100-day EMA at $0.215. Should the correction deepen, longer-term support resides at a former trendline breakout around $0.203, with a base at $0.150 providing a more distant downside reference.
For now, Cardano’s recovery trend remains intact, as market participants await confirmation of a breakout or signs of consolidation near the critical $0.299-$0.300 resistance area.
Cardano (ADA) po spuštění mainnetu RealFi za 24 hodin posílilo téměř o 10 % na 0,273 USD; otevřený zájem u futures kontraktů vzrostl o 15 % na 614,98 milionu USD.
TLDR Cardano (ADA) advanced nearly 10% on Monday, reaching $0.273. The price surge came after the RealFi mainnet went live on October 3, a project backed by Charles Hoskinson. Futures open interest increased 15% to reach $614.98 million. Over the past 30 days, ADA has gained 27%, surpassing both Ethereum and Solana. Market participants are monitoring the $0.260 support zone before targeting the $0.30 level. Cardano’s native token advanced to $0.273 during Monday’s trading session. The gain represented a nearly 10% increase over the previous 24 hours, building on a 6% climb recorded the day prior.
Cardano (ADA) Price This performance positioned ADA among the top-gaining major cryptocurrencies during that trading window. Bitcoin maintained levels above $85,700, while Ethereum exchanged hands above $2,730.
XRP remained above $1.520 throughout the same timeframe. With the wider cryptocurrency market experiencing relatively muted price action, Cardano’s upward movement drew particular attention.
Catalysts Behind the Price Movement The price surge coincided with RealFi’s mainnet activation on October 3. RealFi represents a real-world asset platform that has received investment support from Charles Hoskinson.
This development provided market participants with a concrete fundamental catalyst beyond general cryptocurrency market dynamics. The launch delivered a practical use case directly integrated with Cardano’s blockchain infrastructure.
Market observers are also monitoring Cardano’s scheduled participation at TOKEN2049 Singapore on October 7 and 8. Such high-profile industry gatherings frequently generate increased interest in featured projects’ token valuations.
Meanwhile, the Cardano community voted down a treasury funding proposal for a Cardano Summit. Even with that setback, ADA has posted a 27% gain across the past 30 days.
Network metrics have shown improvement as well. Total value locked across Cardano-based protocols expanded by 20% within a five-day window, partially attributed to FluidTokens incentive programs delivering a 6% ADA yield through December 31.
Technical analyst Lucky (@LLuciano_BTC) commented on the price action, stating in his view that ADA “is setting its tone for another parabolic run.” This observation captures the optimistic outlook among traders monitoring the token’s recent momentum.
Derivatives Market Indicates Growing Long Positioning According to CoinGlass metrics, ADA futures open interest expanded 15% within a 24-hour period, climbing to $614.98 million. Open interest represents the aggregate value of all outstanding futures contracts.
A positive funding rate emerged concurrently with this increase. Under these conditions, traders maintaining long positions compensate those holding short positions, indicating heightened demand for bullish exposure.
Cardano’s monthly performance has exceeded that of other leading blockchain tokens. ADA’s 27% advance compares favorably to Ethereum’s 10% increase and Solana’s 17% rise during the identical period.
Decentralized exchange volume on Cardano, however, has moved in the opposite direction. Trading volume declined from $11.74 million on October 1 to $5.72 million by October 5, per DefiLlama data.
$ADA ✍🏻
4D A solid manipulation move. On our spot watchlist for the coming days.
Closes above the shaded area would strengthen the case for a move toward the dashed line target. pic.twitter.com/jSrCqaH3AK
— LSTRADER (@LSTraderCrypto) October 5, 2026
At the current price of $0.2718, ADA maintains a position above $0.2632, a Fibonacci retracement level derived from the drawdown between $0.3136 and $0.1385. Sustained daily closes above this technical marker could facilitate a move toward $0.30, followed by the previous peak near $0.3136.
An extended projection identifies $0.3916 as a potential target, though this level represents a longer-term objective rather than an immediate goal. For downside scenarios, the 200-day exponential moving average positioned near $0.2472 serves as the initial support zone.
Beneath that threshold, market participants are focusing on $0.2328, with additional support zones at $0.2260 and the 50-day exponential moving average at $0.2244. These price levels have historically attracted buying pressure.
As of October 5, ADA maintains its position above near-term technical support following the RealFi mainnet activation and in anticipation of its TOKEN2049 Singapore presentation.
Zakladatel Cardano Charles Hoskinson znovu vyzval Gemini k zařazení ADA do nabídky a tvrdí, že burza tím za posledních pět let přišla o tržby ve výši 70 milionů USD.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has renewed his campaign urging Gemini, the major US-based cryptocurrency exchange, to list Cardano’s ADA token. The appeal followed Gemini co-founder Tyler Winklevoss marking the exchange’s 11th anniversary with a celebratory message on X, where Hoskinson directly replied, “List ADA.”
Gemini’s asset listing policy under scrutinyGemini has added support for an extensive range of cryptocurrencies over the years, including assets such as Solana (SOL), Avalanche (AVAX), Polkadot (DOT), Cosmos (ATOM), and Tezos (XTZ). Despite this expansion, Cardano’s native asset ADA remains conspicuously absent from the exchange’s trading options.
Gemini’s official listing policy states that the exchange evaluates assets for potential inclusion based on criteria including maturity, liquidity, market demand, utility, regulatory environment, cybersecurity risks, and control concentration. However, Gemini has never publicly addressed its reasoning around ADA or commented on its absence.
Many Cardano supporters have questioned why one of the largest proof-of-stake cryptocurrencies has not been listed on Gemini, particularly as the exchange has embraced other leading tokens in the same category.
Hoskinson’s persistent campaignCharles Hoskinson has spent years publicly campaigning for ADA’s inclusion. In December 2022, during a period when Gemini was facing challenges involving crypto lender Genesis, Hoskinson remarked that the failure to list ADA appeared “pretty tightly correlated” with bankruptcy or reckless risk-taking. At the time, FTX’s collapse also drew attention, as that exchange had never launched an ADA spot market either.
Later that month, during a Twitter Spaces session, Hoskinson expanded on his point:
“We are still not on Gemini. Turns out that’s probably a good thing because FTX didn’t list us either,” Hoskinson joked.
The light-hearted jabs continued into September 2024, when Hoskinson visited Gemini’s booth at a crypto event, displaying a handwritten sign that read “Wen ADA?” and later posted a photo of it on X with the caption, “I’m just saying… @Gemini.”
In a 2025 interview with Blockchain Daily, Hoskinson took a sharper tone and identified Gemini as the last major US exchange still excluding ADA from its platform. He estimated that Gemini may have lost $70 million in revenue over the past five years by not enabling ADA trading.
Hoskinson suggested that rival trading venues like Binance and Coinbase benefited financially from offering ADA, capturing market share and community interest that Gemini did not.
Industry dynamics and toolsIn an environment where decisions by US regulators or the listing of an altcoin can shift the crypto landscape within seconds, traders have increasingly turned to privacy-first platforms to streamline their operations. Many investors are now adopting solutions like CryptoAppsy, which consolidates live charts, tailored news, and market data without the need for account creation.
These consolidated tools offer portfolio tracking, coin-specific news feeds, and macroeconomic indicators in one interface, helping traders react quickly to breaking events, including exchange listing changes like those being sought for ADA.
Cardano Foundation uzavřela strategické partnerství s japonskou společností Pacific Meta, které má podpořit zavádění blockchainu Cardano v japonských firmách.
The Cardano Foundation has formalized a strategic partnership with Pacific Meta, a Japanese business development consultancy, to help accelerate practical blockchain adoption among Japanese enterprises. Through this collaboration, Cardano aims to move decentralized technology from proof-of-concept stages to real-world business integrations in a region known for its focus on technical credibility and mature corporate processes.
Bringing blockchain to Japanese enterprisesAccording to the Cardano Foundation, the partnership is specifically designed to support Japanese companies as they implement operational use cases built on the Cardano blockchain. The alliance combines Cardano’s global decentralized infrastructure with Pacific Meta’s expertise in local business practices and technology integration within Japan.
Unlike high-level ecosystem agreements, this partnership focuses on immediate operational value. Pacific Meta will handle the critical “last mile,” providing market access, support for integration, and enterprise workflow management, all of which are essential for blockchain success in a Japanese business context.
The Foundation stated that Pacific Meta offers an understanding of the domestic enterprise landscape and is positioned to address the specific challenges companies face when evaluating blockchain for their operations.
In the words of the Cardano Foundation, the partnership is described as a mechanism that will “bring real-world blockchain use cases to life” for Japanese enterprises, aiming to ensure that projects move past pilots into production environments.
The collaboration is expected to act as a direct distribution and operational channel for Japanese businesses seeking blockchain-based innovation but in need of experienced local partners and proven infrastructure.
Cardano’s infrastructure, characterized by a focus on security and scalability, forms the technological backbone, while Pacific Meta will facilitate deployments and ongoing support, ensuring smoother enterprise onboarding and project sustainability.
This approach marks a shift from theoretical blockchain adoption to real, enterprise-level implementations in the Japanese market, which values transparent business partnerships and operational reliability.
Industry observers point out that, while the partnership does not instantly affect ADA’s price or guarantee an upsurge in transaction volume, it strengthens Cardano’s position as a trusted infrastructure provider in a major Asia-Pacific economy.
The deal is part of Cardano’s broader strategy to expand the blockchain’s ecosystem and relevance globally through pragmatic industry collaborations.
Pacific Meta, based in Japan, specializes in helping technology companies integrate with large domestic enterprises, offering support for regulatory navigation and full-scale project implementation.
Analysts note that new distribution layers and operational partnerships like this can help drive ecosystem growth, though results depend on execution and local market response.
The Japanese market has historically required strong on-the-ground networks and demonstrated use cases before scaling new digital infrastructure such as blockchain platforms.
Mini dictionary: Pacific Meta, a Japanese consultancy, specializes in helping foreign technology platforms interface with the Japanese corporate sector and manage business development, integration, and regulatory issues for international deployment.
Charles Hoskinson hájí rozvoj Cardana: RealFi spustilo mainnet a mezi integrace patří USDCx, Pyth, LayerZero a plánovaná podpora Cardano Native Tokens od Fireblocks.
Charles Hoskinson defends Cardano’s progress after criticism over liquidity and usage, pointing to RealFi, Midnight, Pogun and major integrations.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has defended the network’s recent buildout after a critic questioned whether years of development have produced enough liquidity and on-chain use. Pointing to a string of launches and integrations, Hoskinson asked: “What the hell else can I do?”
The exchange began after one community member accused Hoskinson of hurting ADA holders by launching Midnight as a separate network.
Hoskinson rejected that argument, noting that NIGHT itself was issued on Cardano and asking why a project built from the Cardano ecosystem should be viewed as harmful to it.
The stupidity is strong here. Apparently, launching a project on Cardano is bad for Cardano. Tell me where is night the issued. What was the first CNA to be listed on Binance? What wallets do people use to manage their night?
If this is how Cardano treats the people building on… https://t.co/j2x0TvJl63
— Charles Hoskinson (@IOHK_Charles) October 3, 2026
Another critic went further, comparing Hoskinson to a “used car salesman” and pointing to what he described as weak liquidity, stablecoins, and DEX volume.
He also accused Hoskinson of blaming ADA holders rather than developers when the ecosystem struggles.
Charles starting to sound like a used car salesman. If the cars broken, it's your problem. Low liquidity, no stablecoins, no DEX volume. $ADA holders are aways the issue with him never the DEVs. We've been taken for a ride full circle. Most people just want their money back.
— Kash_the_Kreator (@Nikkash4) October 4, 2026
Hoskinson Points to RealFi, Midnight and New Integrations Hoskinson responded with a list of projects that have moved forward this year.
Explain what I should do differently. We just launched RealFI; Pogun is on the way; we launched Midnight; and now we have Midnight. city. We did the Pentad that brought LayerZero, Fireblock, Pyth, Circle, and other integrations to Cardano. We have Draper and Alphagrowth. All…
— Charles Hoskinson (@IOHK_Charles) October 4, 2026
RealFi went live on Cardano mainnet on Oct. 1, following months of public testing. Midnight, meanwhile, launched its network in March, while NIGHT had already launched as a Cardano Native Asset in December 2025.
Midnight.city is also operating in open beta as an AI-focused application tied to the wider Midnight ecosystem.
He also mentioned Pogun, a Bitcoin-focused DeFi project covering credit, yield and bridging. Its 12.29 million ADA treasury request failed to secure enough support in September, although Hoskinson has continued to say the project is moving ahead.
Then there is the Pentad’s infrastructure push. USDCx and Pyth have gone live, LayerZero is being rolled out in phases, and Fireblocks announced plans to add full support for Cardano Native Tokens.
Cardano Now Has to Turn Development Into Usage This is where the criticism becomes measurable.
Cardano currently has about $68.3 million in DeFi TVL and $67.2 million in stablecoins, so the claim that it has “no stablecoins” or DEX activity is not literally accurate. DEXs processed about $4.05 million over 24 hours and $41 million over seven days, with weekly volume up 133%. The network also recorded roughly 18,964 active addresses and 34,905 transactions over 24 hours.
Those numbers show activity, but they also provide the benchmark against which Hoskinson’s recent launches can now be judged.
The Crypto Basic previously reported that Hoskinson believes RealFi could become a major driver of Cardano TVL and eventually help push it toward $1 billion. With RealFi only reaching mainnet this week, that thesis has now moved from development promises to something that can be measured against actual deposits and usage.
Cardano Foundation spustila společně s Petrobras dva projekty k ověřování údajů o udržitelnosti leteckého paliva a obnovitelné nafty na blockchainu Cardano.
Cardano (ADA) traded near $0.273 on October 5, reaching an intraday high of $0.2734, while its 24-hour trading volume approached $1 billion. This puts Cardano above the $0.26 mark, a resistance level that had previously limited the cryptocurrency’s recovery in recent weeks.
New partnerships drive Cardano ecosystemThe rally comes after a series of positive developments for the Cardano ecosystem. The Cardano Foundation, the non-profit organization supporting Cardano’s global adoption and development, recently unveiled two new collaborative projects with Petrobras, the major Brazilian energy company. Both initiatives will use Cardano’s blockchain network to verify sustainability data for aviation fuel and renewable diesel, building on an existing relationship between the two entities.
In addition to institutional expansion, Cardano also secured new technical integrations. Fireblocks, a digital asset custody platform widely used by institutional investors, added support for Cardano Native Tokens. The network previously integrated x402 to enable automated payment solutions managed by artificial intelligence agents.
These updates have contributed to improved sentiment among investors and developers, fueling optimism about Cardano’s future prospects.
Mini dictionary: Fireblocks, a secure digital asset custody and transfer platform, allows institutions to safely manage and move cryptocurrencies and tokens across multiple networks.
Technical signals and futures marketsADA’s immediate technical outlook improved as the asset surpassed the $0.263 threshold. Market analysts have pointed to this level as a key pivot area for further gains.
Vishal Dixit from FXStreet observed that Cardano’s futures open interest climbed about 15% in the previous 24 hours. Simultaneously, positive funding rates implied that traders were broadly positioning for continued upside in ADA.
According to Dixit, if the breakout is sustained, ADA could target $0.30 as its next key resistance, with further momentum likely if buyers maintain control above the $0.275 area.
Other technical readings identify the critical continuation point at approximately $0.2679, while resistance stands near $0.275. A daily close above these areas may open the way for a move toward the $0.28–$0.30 zone, though a retracement below $0.258 would call the current rally into question.
Market tracker Coinpaper also highlighted $0.30 as the next significant liquidity level, should ADA successfully hold above the $0.25–$0.27 range.
LevelSupport/ResistanceSignificance$0.258SupportBreakout at risk if breached$0.263PivotKey breakout point$0.2679ContinuationCrucial for sustained rally$0.275ResistanceUpper boundary before $0.30$0.30Liquidity AreaMajor upside targetOn-chain data and network sentimentDespite the increase in ADA’s price and derivatives activity, Cardano’s decentralized exchange (DEX) volumes remain subdued. On October 3, Cardano DEX transactions dropped to roughly $5.72 million, indicating that the price rally has not been matched by heightened on-chain activity.
This divergence between rising prices and weaker DEX volume underscores the importance of futures positioning, with elevated open interest amplifying potential upside but also increasing the risk of rapid reversals if momentum fades.
Since June, Cardano’s network sentiment has gradually improved after an earlier governance setback, strengthening both developer engagement and broader ecosystem confidence despite mixed trading signals.
Cardano [ADA] successfully held $0.24 and climbed to a five-month high of $0.27. At press time, Cardano traded around $0.26, up 10% on the daily charts.
The altcoin’s price jump came alongside a 297% increase in Spot Trading Volume, reflecting higher market activity.
Source: CoinGlass The rally caught bears on the wrong side. According to CoinGlass data, $2.1 million worth of short positions were liquidated. Even so, bearish positioning persisted as more capital entered the market.
Why are traders still shorting Cardano? Although shorts faced substantial liquidations, traders deployed more capital into the derivatives market.
Source: CoinGlass The altcoin’s Open Interest surged 18% to $635 million alongside a 355% jump in Derivatives Volume. Together, these increases pointed to more outstanding positions and heavier trading activity.
On top of that, Cardano [ADA] recorded $337 million in Futures Inflows against $321 million in Futures Outflows.
Source: CoinGlass However, those flows alone did not establish whether traders favored longs or shorts. The Long/Short Ratio offered a clearer directional clue. It plunged to 0.71, showing a bearish skew across tracked exchanges.
Source: CoinGlass The rally had yet to win over those traders. If Cardano continued climbing, that bearish positioning could leave shorts exposed to another squeeze. Meanwhile, Spot flows presented a different challenge.
Are ADA holders preparing to take profits? The latest gains coincided with rising exchange deposits. According to CoinGlass data, Cardano’s Spot Netflow remained positive for two consecutive days.
Source: CoinGlass At press time, Spot Netflow stood around $1.34 million, up from $1 million the previous day.
Positive Netflow indicated that exchange inflows exceeded outflows, leaving more ADA available for potential selling. That could reflect preparations to take profits, although deposits alone did not confirm that holders had sold.
If those tokens reach the sell side, they could slow the rally. For now, momentum indicators still favored buyers.
Can ADA clear the $0.28 resistance? Despite potential selling pressure, the altcoin’s True Strength Index (TSI) formed a bullish crossover. TSI rose to 24, suggesting strengthening upside momentum.
Cardano also climbed above its 20-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA), which stood at $0.24.
Source: TradingView These two indicators supported the bullish outlook, although continuation would depend on buyers maintaining pressure.
If further gains force shorts to close, ADA could clear $0.28 and bring $0.30 into view. Holding $0.24, near the 20-day and 200-day EMAs, would help preserve that outlook.
However, sustained Spot selling could weaken support. A break below $0.24 could open the way toward $0.22.
Final Summary Cardano gained 10% as $2.1 million in shorts were liquidated, yet derivatives positioning retained a bearish skew. ADA could target $0.28 and $0.30 if buyers hold $0.24 and absorb potential Spot selling.
Cardano za posledních 7 dní zvýšilo objem na DEX o 112 % na 37,14 mil. USD. Počet transakcí vzrostl na 222 000 a tržní kapitalizace stablecoinů na 67,03 mil. USD.
Cardano’s DEX activity has accelerated sharply over the past week, with trading volume posting a triple-digit increase alongside broader growth in network activity and stablecoin liquidity.
DeFiLlama data shows that Cardano’s decentralized exchange volume reached $37.14 million over the past seven days, representing a 112% increase during the period. The network recorded its strongest daily activity on October 1, when DEX volume climbed to $11.74 million.
Trading activity remained elevated over the following 24 hours, with Cardano recording another $7.08 million in DEX volume.
Cardano DEX Volume SundaeSwap Leads Cardano DEX Activity Top decentralized exchange SundaeSwap accounted for most of Cardano’s DEX trading activity during the seven days.
DeFiLlama data shows that SundaeSwap processed $23.51 million in spot volume, putting it well ahead of other DEXes operating on the network. Minswap followed with $6.59 million in trading volume.
Other protocols also contributed to the increase. Dano Finance recorded around $5.17 million, while WingRiders processed $1.8 million. Splash Protocol, Saturn Swap, and MeuliSwap recorded about $31,351, $25,855, and $8,349, respectively.
The distribution indicates that while a few established platforms account for most of Cardano’s DEX activity, trading is also taking place across several smaller protocols.
Cardano DEX Performance Cardano Blockchain Activity Also Picks Up The increase in DEX activity coincides with stronger on-chain activity across the Cardano network.
According to data from Chainspect, Cardano processed 222,000 transactions over the past seven days, representing a 5.7% increase from the previous period. Transaction activity also reached its weekly peak on October 1.
On that day, Cardano processed 43,181 transactions, coinciding with the network’s highest DEX volume of the week at $11.74 million.
Activity has since moderated slightly. Over the past 24 hours, the network processed 37,300 transactions, down 13.52% from the previous day. Despite the short-term decline, Cardano has now processed 124 million transactions since its inception.
Stablecoin Liquidity Strengthens Cardano’s stablecoin market has also expanded alongside the increase in decentralized trading.
The network’s stablecoin market cap has risen by more than 24% over the past seven days to $67.03 million. USDCx represents roughly 69% of that total, making it the dominant stablecoin by market cap on the network.
Meanwhile, Cardano’s total value locked (TVL) across its decentralized finance ecosystem stands at $65.44 million, according to DeFiLlama data. The figure has increased by about 0.15% over the past 24 hours.
The combination of higher DEX volume, increased transaction activity, and growing stablecoin liquidity points to a broader increase in activity across Cardano’s DeFi ecosystem.
Cardano has seen a notable increase in network activity over the past week, with daily transactions up 43% to a seven-day high.
According to blockchain analytics platform Chainspect, Cardano processed 33,467 transactions on September 30, 2026, marking the network’s highest daily transaction count over the preceding seven days.
Daily transaction activity rose from 23,400 to 33,467 transactions, a 43% increase over the seven-day period. Overall, the network processed roughly 190,000 transactions during the week, spanning September 24 to 30, 2026.
As a result, Cardano’s daily transaction activity moved above its reported 2026 average of around 25,000 transactions per day.
Cardano Transaction Volume NIGHT Interest Coincides With Rising Cardano Activity While the exact catalyst behind the latest increase remains unclear, the surge comes amid renewed interest in NIGHT, the native token of Cardano’s privacy-focused Midnight network.
The development follows a bold assertion from Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson, who suggested that NIGHT could outperform Zcash and eventually see massive growth next year. Following his commentary, NIGHT trading activity increased significantly, while its price climbed from around $0.028 to $0.040 on September 30.
Interestingly, NIGHT reached the $0.04 area on the same day Cardano’s daily transaction count hit its seven-day high. Although NIGHT has since slipped below $0.04, the token has continued to attract activity, recording 2,344 transactions within a few hours of October 2.
Cardano Transactions Continue to Climb Meanwhile, Cardano’s network activity has continued to rise beyond the September 30 peak. At the time of writing, the network had recorded 43,200 daily transactions, representing a further 29% increase over the past 24 hours.
The latest increase also comes shortly after Cardano marked its ninth anniversary. At the milestone, the network reported more than 124 million cumulative transactions, alongside nearly 2,887 stake pools and 2,075 validators.
Additionally, Cardano’s average transactions per second (TPS) over the past seven days stands at 0.35, up 10.39% during the period. Meanwhile, the network’s seven-day block time stands at approximately 20.29 seconds.
As Cardano’s transaction activity accelerates, DEX trading volume on the network has also increased significantly over the past week. During this period, weekly DEX volume surged 87.99% to $32.8 million. Meanwhile, 24-hour DEX volume stands at approximately $11 million, highlighting the continued rise in trading activity across Cardano’s decentralized exchanges.
Cardano Foundation oznámila partnerství se společností Pacific Meta, které má urychlit firemní adopci blockchainu v Japonsku. ADA se zároveň drží nad 0,254 USD a denní aktivní adresy vyskočily za týden z 15 588 na více než 27 500.
Key Highlights ADA maintains trading levels above $0.254, securing its position over the 200-day EMA at $0.240. A strategic partnership between Cardano Foundation and Pacific Meta aims to accelerate blockchain adoption across Japanese enterprises. Network engagement surged dramatically, with daily active addresses climbing from 15,588 to more than 27,500 within seven days. Positive funding rates emerge, while futures market data reveals potential overheating and cautious bearish sentiment. Market analyst Crypto Patel forecasts potential price objectives of $1, $3, and $5 contingent on sustained support levels. Cardano’s price action on Friday shows strength above the $0.254 mark. The cryptocurrency has successfully recovered ground above a critical support threshold following challenging conditions experienced during the earlier months of 2025.
Cardano (ADA) Price The resurgence in market attention stems partly from a significant corporate development. On Thursday, the Cardano Foundation unveiled a strategic collaboration with Pacific Meta.
Cardano is deepening its enterprise presence in Japan. 🇯🇵
We’re partnering with @PacificMeta to combine Cardano infrastructure with local market expertise and enterprise integration, helping Japanese companies bring real-world blockchain use cases to life.
Less talk about… pic.twitter.com/mEypDVTHx3
— Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF) October 1, 2026
This alliance focuses on accelerating enterprise-level blockchain integration throughout Japan. The Cardano Foundation outlined its objectives through an official statement on X.
“Through our collaboration with Pacific Meta, we’re merging Cardano’s robust infrastructure with specialized local market knowledge and enterprise-grade integration capabilities, enabling Japanese corporations to implement practical blockchain applications,” the Foundation stated.
Network Engagement Shows Strong Growth The metric of daily active addresses provides insight into actual blockchain utilization. Cardano’s figures in this category demonstrate notable expansion.
Data from Santiment indicates daily active addresses reached 27,548 on Thursday. This represents a significant increase from the 15,588 recorded one week prior. Friday’s figures maintained levels close to 26,800.
An increase in active addresses typically indicates expanding network utilization. This metric is commonly interpreted as a favorable indicator for token valuation prospects.
Funding rates have also shifted into positive territory this week, registering 0.0037% on Friday. This indicates that traders holding long positions are compensating short position holders, reflecting optimistic market sentiment.
However, not all indicators suggest upward momentum. Analysis from CryptoQuant reveals substantial whale activity within ADA’s futures markets, though with predominant selling pressure. Spot market conditions also display characteristics of overextension, suggesting traders should exercise prudence.
Technical Analysts Outline Ambitious Price Objectives Cryptocurrency analyst Sssebi posted technical analysis on X highlighting ADA’s consolidation pattern above a previously breached resistance zone. “This pattern typically demonstrates strong bullish characteristics and could lead to a significant upward movement,” Sssebi noted, suggesting the next leg could drive ADA beyond $0.30.
$ADA keeps consolidating above the resistance area it broke out of and is now using it as support.
This is usually very bullish and we could see a nice pump from here.
Hopefully the next move is above $0.30 pic.twitter.com/H5z5qygxBP
— Sssebi🦁 (@Sssebi) October 2, 2026
Meanwhile, analyst Crypto Patel presented an extended outlook for ADA through X. Patel characterizes ADA as currently residing in an accumulation phase, citing three technical indicators: sustained weekly support levels, preservation of the Fibonacci “golden pocket” zone, and successful reclamation of the $0.235 threshold.
Everyone Sold $ADA At -94%. Smart Money Bought It.
The Weekly Order Block Is Defended, The Golden Pocket Held, And $0.235 Is Reclaimed. The Same Demand Zone Sat Under The 2021 Run.
“The weekly order block remains defended, the golden pocket zone held firm, and the $0.235 level has been reclaimed,” Patel explained.
Patel’s technical analysis identifies a support corridor spanning $0.14 to $0.20, which the analyst designates as a “bullish order block.” Historical data within the chart demonstrates ADA previously rallied over 87% after rebounding from this identical zone during the June through September timeframe.
The analyst’s price objectives include $1, $3, and $5 levels. Achieving the $1 milestone would represent approximately a 292% appreciation from present values. The chart additionally features an extended projection approaching $10, though this extends beyond Patel’s primary targets.
Patel identified a critical invalidation threshold: any weekly close beneath $0.137 would nullify the bullish scenario.
From a technical perspective, Cardano maintains its position above the 50-day EMA at $0.220, the 100-day EMA at $0.212, and the 200-day EMA at $0.240. The Relative Strength Index registers approximately 63, positioned slightly above neutral range.
Near-term support is established at $0.245 and the 200-day EMA at $0.240. The subsequent resistance barrier stands at $0.299, where a daily close above this threshold would be necessary to sustain the ongoing recovery trajectory.
Charles Hoskinson odmítl odpovědnost za adopci Cardana a řekl, že vede jen IOG, zatímco síť je decentralizovaná. ADA se 1. října obchodovala kolem 0,2491 USD, asi 92 % pod historickým maximem z roku 2021.
Charles Hoskinson says he is not responsible for driving Cardano adoption. He clarified that he leads IOG, not Cardano, which operates as a decentralized network. ADA traded near $0.2491 on October 1, about 92% below its 2021 record high. Cardano development continues through projects including Ouroboros Leios and RealFi. Petrobras is testing Cardano for sustainable aviation fuel claims, though adoption-scale data remains undisclosed. Charles Hoskinson has rejected demands that he take responsibility for Cardano adoption and measurable network growth. The Cardano founder responded after a market commentator urged him to focus on developers, trading activity, and everyday uses.
Hoskinson Sets Boundaries on Cardano Adoption On September 29, Hoskinson said Cardano operates without central control. He said he has no official role within the network. “I am not accountable for Cardano adoption,” he wrote.
I am not accountable for Cardano adoption. Full stop. You people cannot seem to get it. Cardano is decentralized. I have no official role. Founders aren't slaves.
— Charles Hoskinson (@IOHK_Charles) September 29, 2026
The critic also questioned Hoskinson’s attention to subjects outside his core expertise. Hoskinson responded that founders are not slaves and said community members misunderstand his role.
He separately corrected a community member who called him Cardano’s chief executive. Hoskinson said he leads Input Output Global, or IOG, the research and engineering company that helped build the network.
ADA Performance Remains Under Scrutiny A September 28 ADA market report placed the token near $0.2537 after an 11.5% weekly gain. Traders had repeatedly failed to push its price above $0.26.
On October 1, ADA traded around $0.2491, roughly 92% below its September 2021 peak of $3.10. Some holders have questioned their investment decisions and Cardano adoption after the prolonged decline.
Hoskinson has previously put his losses from ADA’s decline at about $3 billion.
Separately, Robinhood’s planned crypto futures rollout includes Cardano among eight assets for eligible U.S. customers. The company announced the plans on September 29 but gave no firm launch date. These contracts let traders bet on price changes without an expiry date. Robinhood plans to offer the contracts through Bitstamp.
Network Projects Continue Alongside the Debate Hoskinson remains optimistic about Cardano’s prospects. He has said ADA could return to the ten largest cryptocurrencies by market value before the end of 2026.
His development outlook includes Ouroboros Leios and RealFi. Leios aims to help Cardano process more transactions. RealFi develops financial products that connect crypto capital with assets including loans and government debt. RealFi plans to keep records on Cardano as it reaches other networks.
Meanwhile, Petrobras has developed a Cardano fuel claims platform with PUC-Rio’s Ledger Labs and the Cardano Foundation. The research project records environmental claims linked to sustainable aviation fuel. It tracks who receives each claim and prevents reuse.
The case study does not disclose airline customers, tracked fuel volumes or completed claims. It describes a research application, without providing figures that establish the scale of Cardano adoption.
Open Food Chain na Cardanu ukotvuje ověřená data o dodavatelském řetězci a zpřístupňuje je zákazníkům přes QR kód na obalu. První test u Chocolatemakers ukázal, že kód naskenovala desetina nakupujících, kteří po naskenování strávili v průměru 42 sekund.
Open Food Chain, a consortium partner of the Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF), is anchoring verified supply chain data on @Cardano and surfacing it to shoppers through a QR code printed on product packaging. Scan the code, and a consumer can trace a deforestation-free claim all the way back to the source farm. No token changes hands anywhere in the process.
From Compliance Cost to Competitive Advantage The pitch is straightforward: brands already pay for audits, certificates, and supplier evidence. Open Food Chain takes that existing documentation and converts it into a scannable digital product passport, anchored on Cardano so the underlying data cannot be quietly altered after the fact. According to Open Food Chain, the platform turns traceability records, certificates, and supplier evidence into a live passport accessible through a single QR code, with each claim linked to its evidence, scope, and review status.
Kraft Heinz and dairy trader Interfood are among the early enterprise partners. On the Kraft Heinz side, the collaboration is designed to deploy enterprise-grade food traceability on @Cardano, enabling transparent and scalable data flows across global food value chains, according to a Project Catalyst proposal outlining the initiative. Open Food Chain is contributing co-funding alongside Kraft Heinz technical staff for integration and validation workflows.
Early In-Store Numbers Show Consumer Pull The first real-world retail test ran on Chocolatemakers chocolate. One in ten shoppers scanned the QR code, and those who did spent an average of 42 seconds engaging with the product story behind it. For a shelf interaction, that is a meaningful dwell time and early evidence that transparency, when made accessible, can influence purchasing behavior.
The broader context matters here. European regulators are tightening rules around deforestation and green claims, putting pressure on food brands to back up sustainability statements with verifiable evidence. Open Food Chain is positioning Cardano as the record-keeping layer that makes those claims tamper-evident and auditable, without requiring the consumer to know anything about blockchain. The QR code is the only interface they need.
Open Food Chain, founded in 2017 and based in Amsterdam, has built out deployments across cacao, juice, and meat value chains, with the platform used by more than 3,000 farmers, cooperatives, processors, and retailers across multiple continents, according to the Project Catalyst proposal. Its architecture has been redesigned to consolidate previously separate industry-specific chains onto a single platform integrated with @Cardano.
Sources:
Open Food Chain: Official Website
Project Catalyst: Kraft Heinz Scaling Enterprise Food Traceability on Cardano
Cardano Foundation a Petrobras spouštějí dvě blockchainové aplikace pro SAF a obnovitelný Diesel R. Cílí na sledování dodavatelského řetězce a omezení greenwashingu.
Cardano Foundation and Brazilian state oil giant Petrobras are taking their partnership to the next level, announcing two new blockchain applications targeting sustainable aviation fuel and renewable Diesel R. What started as a corporate education program has evolved into something considerably more ambitious: putting fuel supply chains on-chain to fight greenwashing and improve traceability across Brazil’s energy sector.
From classroom to supply chain The Cardano-Petrobras relationship began in December 2023, when Cardano Academy launched a blockchain education initiative for Petrobras’ roughly 40,000 employees. The first 500 participants received evolving NFTs as credentials.
By 2025, Cardano Foundation had formalized a collaboration with PUC-Rio, one of Brazil’s leading research universities, to develop real blockchain applications for the renewable fuel space, with sustainable aviation fuel, known as SAF, as the primary focus.
Petrobras commenced its first commercial deliveries of domestically produced SAF in December 2025, starting with an initial batch of 3,000 cubic meters. The company has set a target of meeting 100% of Brazil’s domestic SAF demand through co-processing by 2027 to 2029.
SAF is jet fuel produced from non-petroleum sources like agricultural waste, used cooking oil, or other biomass.
What the applications actually do The first application focuses on tokenizing the SAF supply chain, creating verifiable, immutable records of where the fuel came from, how it was processed, and how it moved through the logistics network.
The second application is a decentralized app, or dApp, designed to reward airline passengers who fly on SAF-powered routes. As of November 2025, the project had advanced to the point of active development, with incentive mechanics being built to encourage consumer participation in sustainable fuel adoption.
Alongside these, the partnership has developed what it calls a Proof of Atenas system, an attendance and training verification tool using NFC cards and 3D-printed physical totems to record employee participation in immutable on-chain logs. A pilot ran in 2024, and expanded internal implementation has been under discussion through 2026.
Why this partnership is a landmark for Cardano in the region Cardano Foundation describes the Petrobras collaboration as its first governmental partnership in Latin America. Petrobras is majority state-owned, which means this is effectively a blockchain project with Brazilian government involvement.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Kaye Quema. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Cardano Foundation uzavřela víceletou spolupráci s UCLA Anderson Venture Accelerator. Cardano Academy se od roku 2027 zapojí do blockchainového kurikula a pět startupů získá stipendia Cardano Fellowships.
Cardano Foundation Partners with UCLA Anderson@Cardano_CF has signed a multi-year partnership with the Venture Accelerator at UCLA Anderson School of Management (@uclaanderson), marking one of the more concrete moves by a major blockchain network to embed itself inside a top-tier business school.
Under the agreement, Cardano Academy content will be built directly into UCLA's blockchain course curriculum starting in 2027. The integration is designed to give students structured, research-grounded exposure to @Cardano's protocol and real-world enterprise applications. The Cardano Academy has previously expanded its reach through enterprise-focused programs, including an AI and Blockchain for Business Leaders course.
The partnership is not purely academic. The Venture Accelerator at UCLA Anderson supports standout startups across the UCLA entrepreneurial ecosystem , and the Cardano tie-up adds a dedicated blockchain track to that framework.
Fellowships, a Masterclass, and a Sponsored CertificateThe collaboration kicks off on October 19 with a masterclass focused on enterprise Web3 and AI agents. Attendees will leave with a sponsored certificate, giving the event a tangible credential component from day one.
Beyond the classroom, five early-stage startups at UCLA will receive Cardano Fellowships covering funding, mentorship, and the opportunity to build directly on @Cardano. The fellowship structure mirrors the foundation's existing accelerator model. The Cardano Accelerator Program combines tailored coaching, technical guidance, business workshops, and strategy sessions led by the Cardano Foundation and its network of industry collaborators.
The UCLA deal is the latest in a series of institutional moves by the foundation. The Cardano Foundation recently launched a multi-year partnership with SENAI São Paulo bringing blockchain education and industrial applications to Brazilian industry. The Los Angeles announcement extends that push into the United States, targeting one of the country's most active startup ecosystems.
For $ADA, the practical significance lies in developer and founder pipeline. Embedding Cardano tooling and curriculum at UCLA Anderson gives the network early access to a cohort of business-school-trained founders who may choose to build on the protocol rather than on competing chains.
Sources:
Venture Accelerator at UCLA Anderson, 2026 Cohort Showcase
Cardano Accelerator Program, Cardano Foundation
Cardano Foundation Newsroom
Zakladatel Cardana Charles Hoskinson tvrdí, že privacy projekt Midnight nakonec bude větší než Zcash díky kombinaci ochrany soukromí, AI, cross-chain funkcí a infrastruktury Cardana.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has predicted that privacy-focused blockchain project Midnight will eventually become bigger than Zcash.
Hoskinson believes that this will happen due to a potent combination of privacy technology, artificial intelligence, cross-chain functionality, and Cardano infrastructure.
"Midnight will be bigger than ZCash: selective disclosure, Private Agents, Abstraction with a DeFi Kernel for all major chains, ZK + TEE + MPC, and Cardano's 24/7 uptime combined with the magic of Leios. LFG 2027," Hoskinson wrote.
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Weiss Crypto had earlier claimed that NIGHT had "a good chance of becoming one of the best plays of the next 24 months."
Hoskinson did not specify exactly what he meant by "bigger." The market cap of NIGHT currently stands at $437 million, which makes it the 122nd biggest cryptocurrency market capitalization, CoinGecko data shows. For comparison, ZEC has become a fixture within the top 10 with a market cap of $26.4 billion.
A specialized partner chain The Midnight mainnet went live in March. It is somewhat different from what the description "Cardano privacy chain" might imply.
It is a specialized layer-1 partner chain operating alongside Cardano. It maintains its own ledger, and transactions are processed independently. At the same time, its architecture has important connections with Cardano.
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During an extensive livestream on April 14, Hoskinson described Midnight as arguably the most exciting project Input Output was working on in 2026.
"Midnight is probably the most exciting project that we're working on this year," Hoskinson said.
The Cardano founder boasted about the sheer speed of Midnight's rollout.
"Usually it takes about two to three years for a token to go through all these trials and tribulations, but Midnight lives in fast mode," he said.
Cross-chain expansion is acceleratingAn important part of Hoskinson's latest statement is his reference to a DeFi kernel "for all major chains."
In August, VIA Labs deployed its universal cross-chain messaging system on Midnight. According to the Midnight Foundation, the integration connects Midnight with more than 130 public and private networks
Hoskinson previously argued that Midnight's economics are explicitly designed around cooperation. "The capacity exchange will accept Bitcoin and Ether and Solana and Avalanche and BNB. So, what we found is a tokenomics of cooperation instead of a tokenomics of an adversarial nature," he said.
Hoskinson went as far as describing Midnight as effectively becoming a privacy layer available across the cryptocurrency industry.
"Everything a holder of Night wants is to be friends with everybody in the space and a layer two to everyone effectively. And that's different," he said.
Cardano Foundation oznámila, že Fireblocks přidá plnou podporu pro nativní tokeny Cardana, což má otevřít širší institucionální přístup k aktivům na Cardanu. ADA zároveň vstoupila do programu Mastercard Crypto Partner Program.
In Cardano news this week, the project is entering the final week of September with renewed attention on institutional adoption, network scaling, and broader ecosystem expansion. The latest development came on September 24, when the Cardano Foundation announced that Fireblocks will add full support for Cardano Native Tokens (CNTs).
This will allow the thousands of banks, exchanges, payment firms and fintech companies using the platform to custody, send and receive assets issued on Cardano. Fireblocks already supports ADA, but the expanded integration could give the wider Cardano token economy significantly greater institutional access.
The announcement follows another busy period for the blockchain. Cardano’s Fall 2026 Accelerator Program has selected eight projects focused on areas including digital product passports, verified identity, supply-chain traceability and responsible artificial intelligence.
This latest Cardano news drop comes as the token sits at $0.254, up a modest +0.3% over the past 24 hours following a +14% surge over the past week. Daily trading volume is showing as just over $444M.
Cardano News: Leios Upgrade and Mastercard Crypto Partner Program Adding to the List of Bullish Catalysts for ADA Scaling also remains central to Cardano’s development roadmap. The Leios project continues to progress through prototype development, with recent work focused on improving data handling, node performance, and Endorser Block management.
Cardano’s public Leios testnet went live earlier this year, providing developers and researchers with an environment to test the proposed scaling architecture.
Connecting Cardano with the future of global payments.
The Cardano Foundation has joined Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program.
As part of its Blockchains track, we’ll engage with Mastercard and other participants working across payments and stablecoins on areas including… pic.twitter.com/eeZ6K2UrPY
— Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF) September 15, 2026
For ADA holders, the combination of institutional infrastructure and continued technical development provides an important backdrop. However, the key question remains whether these developments can translate into sustained network usage and demand for ADA itself.
The Cardano Foundation entered Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program on September 15. It joined more than 100 firms already inside the network. The deal targets cross-border payments, business transfers, and stablecoin use. It links ADA to rails that move $9.2 trillion each year. Six days later, ADA joined the x402 tool, opening the door to AI payments on its own chain.
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ADA Price Analysis $ADA
Cardano's upward channel holds while the wave 4 structure stays corrective.
Elliott Wave Analysis#Cardano pic.twitter.com/0mzNlfNzar
— More Crypto Online (@Morecryptoonl) September 27, 2026
In other Cardano news, CoinGecko currently prices ADA at about $0.25, up about 0.3% over 24 hours and +14.6% over seven days. ADA has traded between approximately $0.233 and $0.253 over the past 24 hours, while its market capitalization stands near $9.29Bn.
Technically, the recent move has strengthened ADA’s short-term momentum. The $0.25 area represents the immediate psychological resistance level; a sustained break above it could bring $0.27-$0.28 into focus. Conversely, failure to hold the recent breakout could see ADA retest support around $0.23, followed by the $0.22 region.
With ADA already up almost 19% over the past month, momentum has clearly improved. The next test will be whether buyers can turn the $0.25 level from resistance into sustained support before attempting to reclaim $0.30.
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ADA dnes vzrostla o 5 % na 24hodinové maximum 0,2544 USD poté, co FC Barcelona spustila Barça Fan Lab na Cardanu. Platforma má fanouškům nabídnout digitální průkazy totožnosti, sběratelské předměty a Web3 portfolio.
Cardano price rose 5% today to a 24-hour high of $0.2544 as FC Barcelona launched Barça Fan Lab on Cardano. The platform, developed with Andamio, will support fan participation, digital credentials, collectibles, and Web3 portfolios.
ADA Price Jumps as Barça Fan Lab Launches According to the Cardano Foundation, FC Barcelona has launched Barça Fan Lab with Andamio using Cardano infrastructure. The platform aims to shift fans from being passive consumers of content to active participants in the digital space.
The Barcelona project adds another use case to Cardano’s expanding blockchain ecosystem. That expansion was most recently made possible via the x402 software kit, which made it possible for applications and AI agents to handle transactions with ADA.
While these developments expand Cardano’s utility, ADA also saw sharp price movement during the session. Despite rising, the token later pulled back from its $0.2544 high as selling pressure emerged near resistance. At press time, Cardano traded at $0.2482, holding a 1.47% jump over the last 24 hours.
FC Barcelona Brings Fan Credentials to Cardano Through the Barça Fan Lab, supporters will be able to learn the club’s history, identity, and values using structured learning pathways. On top of this, fans are able to participate in community events and earn verifiable digital credentials.
Access will use BarçaID, while each participant can create a Cardano-based Web3 portfolio. The portfolio may store credentials and access tokens that are obtained from activities conducted on the platform.
The program will include club history, sustainability, digital communities, and Web3 use cases. These include collectibles, loyalty functionality, NFTs, smart contracts, and recognition systems on the blockchain.
Other topics range from inclusion, empowerment of women, technology, and responsible digital innovation. Subsequently, FC Barcelona wants fans to participate and receive verifiable recognition for their contributions.
Catalyst Fund 13 Supports Barça Fan Lab Development Barça Fan Lab is supported through Cardano’s Catalyst Fund 13, while Andamio serves as the technology partner. Catalyst accepts proposals from the public, goes through community review, and votes on these projects.
The learning pathways, digital credentials, and community activities are made possible through the infrastructure provided by Andamio. That collaboration allows Barcelona to have a Cardano-based solution to ensure that fans participate and their actions are registered and verified.
The project comes at a time when Cardano’s network infrastructure is undergoing a broader transformation. The changes are preparations for the Dijkstra upgrade as part of the network’s planned protocol development on Node 11.1.1.
As we reported, Node 11.1.1 removed older tracing systems and addressed issues linked to Genesis operations. Later releases, however, will set up Plutus V4 and nested transactions in advance of the final protocol upgrade.
Fireblocks přidává podporu pro Cardano Native Tokens, takže banky a fintechy je mohou držet, posílat i přijímat v rámci stejného bezpečnostního systému. Integrace pokrývá standardy CIP-26 i CIP-68.
Cardano Native Tokens Get Institutional-Grade Custody@FireblocksHQ has formally introduced support for @Cardano_CF Native Tokens (CNTs), opening the door for banks, fintechs, and financial institutions to manage and transfer CNTs through the same policy engine and security framework they already use for other digital assets. The announcement, made on September 24, 2026, marks a meaningful step in bridging the Cardano ecosystem with traditional financial infrastructure.
Before this integration, institutions looking to handle CNTs had to rely on manual processes or custom workarounds. Before this deal, institutions handling CNTs had to rely on manual processes or raw signing workarounds. Now they are able to custody, send, and receive CNTs using the same policy controls and security architecture already applied to other digital assets on the platform. That friction has now been removed, with CNTs treated operationally on a par with more established institutional holdings.
The Fireblocks platform secures roughly $16 trillion in digital asset transactions and is used by thousands of banks, fintechs, and asset managers worldwide. Plugging CNTs into that infrastructure gives the Cardano ecosystem access to a distribution channel that few blockchain networks have reached.
Emurgo, Pentad, and Iagon assisted in the integration process, according to the Cardano Foundation. This latest announcement builds on earlier groundwork: a May 2026 integration with Iagon had already added staking and governance functionality for Cardano via an SDK, giving institutions a partial on-ramp.
CIP-26 and CIP-68 Standards Built Into the IntegrationThe implementation natively supports both of Cardano's primary token metadata standards. Cardano supports two primary metadata standards for fungible tokens: CIP-26, an off-chain metadata standard that stores data in a centralized or semi-centralized registry suitable for simple and static use cases, and CIP-68, an on-chain metadata standard that uses datums to store dynamic and programmable metadata directly on the blockchain, enabling advanced use cases. By supporting both, the Fireblocks integration covers the full spectrum of CNTs currently in circulation, from straightforward fungible tokens to more complex programmable assets.
Custody and asset transfer for CNTs becoming more uniform across a major platform like Fireblocks supports greater interoperability between Cardano-based tokens and the traditional financial institutions that increasingly touch digital assets. The go-live date gives both sides roughly six months from announcement to implementation, which is a reasonable timeline for the kind of technical certification and compliance review that institutional platforms require before flipping a switch on a new asset class.
For Cardano, the integration addresses a long-standing gap in its institutional story. The technology has often been viewed as technically rigorous but operationally difficult for large financial players to access. Fireblocks support changes that calculus in a practical way.
Sources:
Crypto Briefing: Cardano Native Tokens to get full institutional custody support on Fireblocks
Cardano Developer Portal: Token Metadata Standards (CIP-26 and CIP-68)
Cardano získalo novou nativní knihovnu Mesmo pro Python, Go, Rust a JavaScript bez nutnosti Java Virtual Machine. Cardano Foundation uvádí, že pokrývá chybějících 5 % potřeb vývojářů.
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In a recent development, Cardano has welcomed a new native library for Python, Go, Rust, and JavaScript. Mesmo, a native shared library, implements Cardano's core functionality in Python, Go, Rust, and JavaScript without requiring a Java Virtual Machine.
In an official blog post, the Cardano Foundation explains the rationale behind Mesmo. Cardano SDKs cover 95% of developer needs, with Mesmo now filling the missing 5%—in Python, Go, Rust, and JavaScript—with no library switch.
Oftentimes, though, developers need to access extra features that sit outside of a certain library, with Mesmo giving them that option. Mesmo works by taking Cardano Client Lib (CCL)—the mature Java SDK—and compiling it with GraalVM Native Image into an ordinary shared library with a plain C ABI.
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Cardano node diversity gains tractionAs Cardano explores advancements in its native library, alternative node development continues to gain momentum. Dingo, developed by Blink Labs, recently reached a major milestone—validating blocks that have been accepted by the Mainnet network, expanding its accomplishments across Preview, PreProd, Musashi, Prime Testnet, and now Cardano Mainnet.
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Meanwhile, the latest Amaru release introduces improvements to duplex connections, peer management, block fetching, and governance-related functionality.
The Amaru node team achieved its Q3 goal with the release of a robust relay node binary and is now targeting a block-producing pre-release from September 29, followed by a beta approximately four weeks later, and first Mainnet block production in Q4.
In another demonstration of implementation diversity, a full Haskell Cardano node has also been demonstrated running directly in a web browser, following the chain tip and supporting transaction functionality.
As reported, Cardano recently marked its 9th anniversary with the first genesis block created on September 23, 2017. The mainnet launched six days later, on September 29, 2017, introducing ADA and beginning Cardano's journey as a public blockchain.
At the time of writing, Cardano (ADA) was trading up 4.80% in the last 24 hours to $0.25 and up 23% weekly.
Cardano Foundation se připojila do Mastercard Crypto Partner Program a testy Ouroboros Leios ukázaly zhruba 1 000 transakcí za sekundu. ADA za posledních sedm dní přidala asi 12 %.
Key Highlights ADA was changing hands around $0.22, building on the previous week’s upward movement as it approached the 200-day exponential moving average. Cardano Foundation announced its entry into Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program, with emphasis on payment solutions, enterprise transactions and stablecoin infrastructure. Simulated testing of Ouroboros Leios demonstrated throughput capabilities of approximately 1,000 transactions per second, based on recent Cardano ecosystem reports. Technical analyst Jesse Olson noted ADA appears positioned to finish the week with bullish indicators, pointing to reversal patterns, RSI momentum and positive trend signals. Immediate upside targets lie between $0.2270 and $0.2464, with downside protection concentrated around $0.2030 to $0.2080. The Cardano token maintained its upward trajectory on Monday, with ADA hovering near the $0.22 mark following last week’s solid performance.
The digital asset recorded approximately 12% appreciation during the prior seven-day period and sustained its momentum as market participants digested fresh ecosystem announcements and strengthening chart patterns.
Current price levels have lifted ADA beyond both its 50-day and 100-day exponential moving averages, currently positioned around $0.2038 and $0.2029 respectively.
The subsequent critical technical benchmark is the 200-day EMA. Various charting platforms show this indicator ranging from approximately $0.2401 to $0.2464.
Mastercard Collaboration and Network Testing Boost Sentiment Cardano Foundation announced via X its participation in Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program.
Connecting Cardano with the future of global payments.
The Cardano Foundation has joined Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program.
As part of its Blockchains track, we’ll engage with Mastercard and other participants working across payments and stablecoins on areas including… pic.twitter.com/eeZ6K2UrPY
— Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF) September 15, 2026
The collaboration targets international payment infrastructure, commercial transaction systems and stablecoin settlement capabilities, representing another significant enterprise adoption milestone for the Cardano network.
Meanwhile, Cardano’s planned Leios protocol enhancement has generated interest following recent test results showing approximately 1,000 transactions per second during simulation environments.
According to a Cardano ecosystem progress report, these numbers emerged from Ouroboros Leios testing phases, with developers suggesting a potential mainnet deployment within the current calendar year if development timelines remain on schedule.
It’s important to note these simulation figures differ from current mainnet performance. Actual network environments typically face additional challenges including latency variations, bandwidth constraints and diverse node participation patterns.
The Leios framework aims to leverage endorser block architecture and parallel transaction processing to scale throughput without simply increasing block size parameters.
These technical developments arrive as ADA trades above the 20-day Bollinger Band median line positioned near $0.2079.
Technical Picture Shows ADA Nearing Critical Levels The Bollinger Band upper boundary rests around $0.2270, representing an initial near-term obstacle for further price appreciation.
Above this threshold, market observers are monitoring the March 29 support-turned-resistance around $0.2328 and the 200-day EMA zone between $0.24 and $0.25.
Technical momentum gauges have strengthened noticeably. Various daily charts show RSI readings ranging from 58.2 to approximately 64, indicating building bullish pressure.
The MACD indicator has generated a bullish crossover above its signal line, with the histogram bars turning positive.
Technical strategist Jesse Olson shared on X that ADA looks set to register a weekly buy signal. His analysis highlighted a reversal candlestick formation, RSI buy confirmation and positive trending indicators, noting that reversal patterns have been developing over recent months.
For downside scenarios, the 50% Fibonacci retracement level near $0.2084 provides initial support, with the 50-day and 100-day EMAs clustered around $0.2030 offering additional cushion.
Recent metrics showed Cardano’s total value locked hovering near $57 million, while derivatives open interest registered approximately $430 million according to latest available figures.
Based on current technical positioning, ADA maintains ground above near-term support structures while remaining beneath the 200-day EMA, establishing the $0.2270 to $0.2464 range as the critical zone for upcoming price development.
Cardano se oficiálně integrovalo do x402 SDK, takže aplikace i AI agenti mohou platit za API volání v ADA přes běžné HTTP požadavky. Podpora běží i pro Cardano-native stablecoiny USDM, DJED a iUSD.
Cardano just got plugged into the plumbing of the internet’s payment layer. The blockchain’s native integration into the x402 SDK means that applications and autonomous AI agents can now pay for API calls in ADA or Cardano-native tokens through ordinary HTTP requests, skipping the usual hassle of accounts, API keys, or subscription plans.
The merge into the official x402 repository landed around September 9, 2026, with Cardano Foundation engineers contributing the client, server, and facilitator components needed to make the whole thing work.
How x402 actually works The x402 protocol is built around a piece of web infrastructure that’s been collecting dust for decades: HTTP status code 402, literally named “Payment Required.” When HTTP was designed, 402 was reserved for future use.
The idea is straightforward. A server hosts an API. When a client, whether human-operated or an autonomous AI agent, makes a request, the server responds with a 402 status code indicating that payment is required. The client then constructs a signed transaction on the Cardano blockchain, sends it along with the request, and the server verifies the payment before delivering the data or service. No middlemen, no billing portals, no monthly invoices.
Cardano’s extended UTxO (eUTxO) model is particularly well-suited for this pattern. Transactions are user-signed and settle directly on-chain, meaning the payment and the proof of payment are baked into the same cryptographic step.
The integration supports Cardano’s mainnet along with the preprod and preview testnets, giving developers a sandbox to experiment before going live. Beyond ADA itself, the framework accommodates Cardano-native stablecoins including USDM, DJED, and iUSD, which matters for any use case where price volatility would make raw crypto payments impractical.
From third-party experiment to official standard This wasn’t Cardano’s first brush with x402-style functionality. Third-party projects like the Masumi Network had previously built x402 capabilities on top of Cardano. But those were independent implementations, not part of the canonical codebase.
The x402 Foundation, which operates under the umbrella of the Linux Foundation, oversees the protocol’s development. Having Cardano’s integration merged into this officially governed repository means it’s not a side project or a community fork. Cardano Foundation engineers didn’t just write an adapter; they contributed working examples that other developers can use as templates.
The AI agent angle x402 offers a model where an AI agent can encounter a paid API, evaluate the cost, sign a transaction, and proceed, all within a single HTTP request-response cycle. No OAuth tokens expiring at inconvenient moments. No webhook callbacks to confirm payment processed. The transaction is the authorization.
The stablecoin support is a pragmatic touch here. An AI agent buying weather data or language model inference probably shouldn’t be exposed to the volatility of a native token. Letting it pay in USDM or DJED while still settling on the Cardano chain captures the network effects without the price risk.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Delegovaní zástupci Cardana zamítli žádost Input Output o 12,29 milionu ADA na projekt POGUN, přestože ústavní výbor ji jednomyslně schválil. Charles Hoskinson uvedl, že Input Output už nebude automaticky stavět produkty na Cardanu.
TLDR Cardano’s delegated representatives voted down a request for 12.29 million ADA meant for Input Output’s Pogun project. The Constitutional Committee approved the same proposal with a unanimous vote, but DRep support fell short. Charles Hoskinson said Input Output will no longer build products on Cardano by default. Pogun is designed to bring Bitcoin into decentralized finance and was expected to share earnings with Cardano’s treasury. Hoskinson said two products, RealFi and Pogun, are still expected to launch on Cardano before the end of the year. Cardano’s community governance system blocked a funding request tied to one of the network’s founding companies. The vote shows that even Input Output, the firm that built much of Cardano’s early technology, has to compete for treasury money like any other applicant.
The proposal asked for 12.29 million ADA to fund Pogun, a credit and liquidity product built to bring Bitcoin into decentralized finance. Input Output pitched the idea as a way to connect Bitcoin holders with Cardano’s financial tools.
In exchange for the funding, Input Output offered to return 20% of Pogun’s earnings to Cardano’s treasury until the initial investment was repaid. After that, the company proposed a lasting 5% share from products tied to Cardano.
How the Vote Played Out Two separate governance bodies reviewed the proposal, and they reached different conclusions. Cardano’s Constitutional Committee voted seven in favor with zero against, a full approval from that group.
Delegated representatives, known as DReps, hold different authority. These are voters who receive voting power delegated to them by ADA holders across the network.
The DRep vote did not go the same way. Final numbers showed 35.67% in favor and 64.33% against, which meant the funding request expired without moving forward.
Because Cardano’s system requires both bodies to align on treasury spending, the mismatch was enough to stop the withdrawal. The committee liked the proposal. The DReps did not.
Charles Hoskinson addressed the result in a broadcast on September 18, 2026. He said Input Output will now choose whichever network fits each product best, rather than defaulting to Cardano first.
He added that Cardano remains the strongest technical option for Bitcoin-based decentralized finance projects that rely on Bitcoin-style transaction structures. He said this is still true even after the vote.
What Happens Next Hoskinson said RealFi is expected to launch on Cardano in October 2026. He said Pogun is expected to follow within 90 days of his broadcast, placing a possible launch around mid-December.
He also said that without treasury funding, Pogun is no longer required to stay tied to Cardano. He said traffic from the product could be routed to other blockchain networks instead.
Hoskinson did not rule out the possibility that another network could offer support to Pogun in exchange for some form of exclusivity. The original proposal reviewed by voters did not include language requiring Pogun to stay on Cardano.
This is not the first sign of Input Output building outside Cardano. Midnight City V2, an application connected to the Midnight network, was documented in July 2026, before the Pogun vote took place.
That timing means the shift toward building on multiple networks did not start with this one funding decision. It appears to reflect a wider approach already underway at Input Output.
If Pogun does launch on Cardano as planned, the network could still see transaction activity and value flow through its system. That would happen without the revenue-sharing terms that voters turned down.
For now, Cardano’s treasury remains unspent on this proposal, and Input Output is free to pursue funding or partnerships through other channels.
Fetch.ai pozastavila konverze AGIX-to-FET po exploitu bridge infrastruktury SingularityNET; podle aliance bylo z konvertoru odcizeno asi 1,56 milionu USD v FET. FET za posledních 24 hodin klesl o 1,53 % na 0,1773 USD.
TLDR: Fetch.ai says its contracts remain unaffected while the exploit targets SingularityNET bridge infrastructure. An unauthorized party withdrew about $1.56 million in FET from the converter, according to the alliance. AGIX-to-FET conversions remain paused while teams review the bridge and related migration contracts. FET trades near $0.1773, while chart support sits at $0.1697 and major resistance stands near $0.1905. Artificial Superintelligence Alliance token FET traded at $0.1773 after falling 1.53% over the previous 24 hours. The decline followed reports of a bridge exploit linked to the FET migration system. However, Fetch.ai said its own contracts were not affected by the incident and continued to operate normally across its network.
The reported attack targeted SingularityNET contracts, mainly the bridge connecting Ethereum and Cardano. Fetch.ai said unauthorized minting occurred through that route during the incident. After the announcement, the Artificial Superintelligence Alliance reported an unauthorized withdrawal worth about $1.56 million in FET, saying the funds came from the converter connected to the migration system.
The alliance said treasury and exchange wallets were not affected by the breach and noted FET held in private wallets or exchanges remained unaffected. Holders were told that no action was required at the time, with the FET price not reacting so much to the exploit.
Fetch.ai Halts AGIX-to-FET Conversions Following Bridge Exploit Fetch.ai paused AGIX to FET conversions while investigators reviewed the affected bridge infrastructure. The company also paused its Ethereum-side bridge contract as a precaution. It said there was no indication that this contract contained the exploited weakness. Both services are expected to return after further security checks. Bridge services play a separate role from normal token transfers on the Fetch.ai network.
Their temporary suspension limits conversion activity while teams review the affected contracts and transaction history. Normal FET trading remains available. The company said the exploit had been contained, while the investigation remained active. Fetch.ai is working with the SingularityNET team and external security partners.
The teams have not yet published a full technical report on the breach. Further verified updates are expected after investigators complete their review. The event centers on migration infrastructure used by members of the Artificial Superintelligence Alliance. Earlier migration plans combined AGIX and OCEAN into FET under the alliance structure.
That system allowed users to convert supported tokens as the projects moved toward a shared token framework. The latest pause affects AGIX-to-FET conversions rather than normal FET network operations. Fetch.ai said no Fetch.ai contract was under threat when it published its update. The distinction matters because the reported breach involved connected bridge infrastructure, not the core Fetch.ai contracts.
FET Price Defends Key Fibonacci Support After Bridge Exploit FET remained under selling pressure after the security news entered the market. According to a crypto analyst, the chart showed FET holding near the 50% Fibonacci retracement at $0.1697. That level remains an important short-term support area for the token. Immediate resistance sits near $0.1741, followed by the $0.1795 Fibonacci level. FET would need stronger buying pressure to hold above those levels.
Source: X
The chart also showed recent higher lows and higher highs from the August bottom near $0.12. This structure remains intact while FET stays above its recent higher-low region. The next major resistance sits near $0.1883 and $0.1905. A daily close above $0.1905 would confirm a stronger breakout from the current range.
According to the analyst, the downside support sits near $0.1653 and $0.1604 if selling pressure increases. The more important structural support remains around $0.1512 on the chart. A move below that area would break the recent higher-low pattern.
ADA za posledních 24 hodin vzrostla o 8,14 % na 0,2191 USD poté, co testování Ouroboros Leios dosáhlo asi 1 000 TPS. Vývojáři uvedli, že spuštění na mainnetu by mohlo přijít letos.
Cardano’s ADA token saw a strong price uptick, rising 8.14% to $0.2191 in the past 24 hours, after significant progress in scalability testing was reported. The boost comes as developers from Input Output Global (IOG), the research and development company behind Cardano, demonstrated around 1,000 transactions per second (TPS) throughput using the Ouroboros Leios upgrade.
Developer milestones drive optimismDiscussion on the Cardanians X channel drew attention to the test results, highlighting that, “~1,000 TPS with Ouroboros Leios in testing,” was achieved. The post further noted that if development continues smoothly, Leios could launch on the Cardano mainnet this year.
Ouroboros Leios testing reached about 1,000 TPS, far higher than Cardano’s usual level of 10 TPS, and deployment on the mainnet could happen this year if all goes to plan.
Currently, Cardano’s mainnet maintains a throughput of roughly 10 TPS, according to data from Cexplorer. The exposure of Leios’ performance in a test environment underlines the platform’s ambition to drastically improve scalability for future applications and network usage.
Ouroboros Leios is designed as part of Cardano’s ongoing roadmap to increase network capacity and performance, making the blockchain more competitive in handling complex applications and higher activity levels.
Mini dictionary: Ouroboros Leios is a forthcoming consensus protocol upgrade for Cardano focused on significantly boosting transaction throughput while maintaining security and decentralization. It is one of the latest evolutions in Cardano’s Ouroboros family of protocols.
Technical momentum and resistance levelsADA is currently positioned above its 20-day Bollinger Band midline, set at $0.2079, with the upper band at $0.2270 serving as a key resistance level. Support levels are noted at $0.2050 and $0.2079.
MetricCurrent ValueSignificancePrice$0.21918.14% 24h increase20-day BB Midline$0.2079Current supportUpper BB$0.2270Near-term resistanceRSI58.23Indicates positive momentum, below overbought thresholdThe Relative Strength Index (RSI) stands at 58.23, which is above the moving average RSI of 52.95, reflecting strengthening momentum. However, it remains below the overbought benchmark of 70. Trading volumes were not specified in the available data.
A move above $0.2270 could bring further resistance into play, while a decline below $0.2050 may impact the current trading setup. The lower Bollinger Band at $0.1889 provides an additional point for technical monitoring.
Total value locked and DeFi activityCardano’s total value locked (TVL), according to DeFiLlama, stands at approximately $57 million. Recent days have shown fluctuations in TVL, DEX trades, and the number of active addresses and transactions, indicating steady but not exponentially increasing platform usage.
This pattern highlights that while Leios testing demonstrates massive potential for higher throughput, clear evidence of a surge in DeFi or overall ecosystem activity is not yet reflected in the data provided.
Market trends and open interestAccording to CoinGlass, Cardano’s open interest currently hovers around $430 million. This is below the peak near $580 million reached in August, but remains higher than the $400 million mark.
Date/PeriodOpen InterestCurrent$430 millionAugust peak$580 millionRecent low$400 millionLiquidation charts from CoinGlass display ongoing spikes in both short and long positions, indicating sustained leveraged trading activity in ADA.
The primary catalyst for current interest remains Leios testing, with technical indicators supporting ADA’s rise as it trades above important support levels and with RSI momentum on its side.
Traders are closely monitoring whether ADA can hold above $0.2079 and retest the resistance at $0.2270 as development continues. The broader crypto market continues to exhibit high volatility, meaning price movements could shift rapidly in response to news, sentiment, or technical changes within the Cardano ecosystem.
Input Output Group varuje uživatele, aby se vyhnuli jeho YouTube kanálu, který údajně streamoval AI upravené video Charlese Hoskinsona s příslibem zdvojnásobení majetku. Firma nedoporučuje klikat na odkazy ani posílat peníze.
Cardano’s IOG warns users to avoid YouTube channel amid apparent hijackInput Output Group told users to avoid its YouTube channel after it began livestreaming a suspected AI-manipulated Charles Hoskinson video promising to “double your wealth.”
Input Output Group has urged users to avoid its YouTube channel, with the channel on Friday livestreaming a suspected AI-manipulated video of Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson promoting a crypto giveaway.
The livestream purported to be a town hall for Project Catalyst, a decentralized community innovation fund and grant program. It was live for nearly two hours.
Source: YouTube
The suspected manipulated video of Hoskinson directs viewers to a QR code with a promise to “double your wealth.”
“Please avoid interacting with the IO Group YouTube channel until further notice,” the company said in a warning on its official X account.
It advised users against clicking links, sending funds or sharing personal information in response to content on the channel.
Cointelegraph reached out to Input Output Group for comment.
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Splash Protocol opravil chybu ve smart kontraktu po exploitu na Cardanu, ale z poolu stále chybí 2,424,778 ADA. Držitelé OADA zatím nemají funkční exit.
What HappenedSplash Protocol has patched the smart contract vulnerability behind the September 13 exploit that drained its Cardano-based $ADA/OADA StableSwap pool. The fix closes the documented attack path, but it cannot recover the funds that are already gone.
According to Splash's incident report, one actor used two transactions to remove 2,434,648 ADA and 1,988,222 OADA. After subtracting the attacker's 9,870 ADA deposit, but before network fees, the net ADA drain was 2,424,778.
The pool's validator calculated a "tradable" reserve by subtracting accrued protocol fees from its real balances. According to Splash, it did not require that reserve to remain positive, bounded fee changes only from below, and did not enforce the direction of a swap. Those missing checks allowed the validator to accept a transaction after the tradable ADA reserve had turned negative.
Either fix would close the documented exploit path, but neither would return the ADA that had already left the pool. Immediately after the drain, the pool held just 10 ADA and about 1.44 million OADA, while its tradable ADA reserve was negative and its LP token balance was unchanged.
The Liquidity Problem That RemainsA usable relaunch would require more than corrected validator logic. It would need replenished ADA liquidity or a protocol redemption mechanism, along with a way to address the OADA inventory in the thin secondary market.
Optim Finance said on September 13 that its protocol was paused, remaining liquidity had been removed, and OADA-to-ADA swaps were unavailable. In a September 15 update, it said it was indexing the chain and compiling a full accounting of impacted addresses and assets while working toward a resolution. That update did not announce restored liquidity, redemption, or operations.
The balance-sheet damage matters because Splash's September 13 snapshot said OADA had no protocol-level redemption. Other OADA venues in the report were close to empty at that time, with the listed pools holding only single- or double-digit ADA balances.
DefiLlama data showed Splash Protocol total value locked (TVL) near $3.3 million on Cardano, with a one-day decline of roughly 27 percent in one snapshot in the wake of the incident. Cardano DeFi as a whole was tracking around $55 million in TVL. Until new liquidity is injected or a formal redemption route is announced, OADA holders remain without a meaningful exit.
Sources:
CryptoSlate: Cardano's Splash fix patches the exploit, but leaves 2.4M ADA missing and holders trapped
Crypto Times: Optim Finance Pauses OADA After Splash Pool Exploit Drains Cardano Liquidity
Cardano (ADA) dnes vzrostlo o 7,7 % na 0,213 USD před hlasováním o stažení 11,8 milionu ADA z treasury. Hlasování o návrhu OpenZeppelin Stack běží do 11. října.
Cardano (ADA) price is up by 7.7% today, September 18, to trade at $0.213 at the time of writing. These gains come ahead of a governance vote on the Cardano network looking to withdraw $2.5 million worth of Cardano from Treasury.
Cardano Treasury Proposal Opens Voting Until October 11 The Cardano community has until October 11 to vote for the OpenZeppelin Stack proposal. This proposal looks to withdraw 11.8 million ADA from the shared Cardano treasury.
If this proposal passes, the 11.8 million ADA will be used to get the OpenZeppelin open-source development stack for Cardano. This will bring audited building blocks to Cardano that could bring more institutions and DeFi players to the network.
However, the 11.8 million ADA will not be released to OpenZeppelin all at once. Instead, 20% of the ADA will be released after the legal contract is signed, and the other 80% will be going out in four equal batches.
Still, some users are criticizing the proposal, saying that it is the sae as the ongoing Developer Experience on Cardano. One user even questioned whether what Cardano will get out of this is worth 11.8M ADA.
Cardano Price Outperforms Bitcoin and Ethereum as Rounded Bottom Emerges Cardano price has jumped by nearly 8% today, outperforming Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), which were up by 1.9% and 2%, respectively, at the time of writing.
The gains have pushed Cardano value today above the resistance of a rounded bottom pattern at $0.212.
The RSI reading of 65 supports a bullish long-term Cardano price prediction. This RSI reading also suggests that ADA price is still not overbought despite moving from $0.19 to $0.21 within two days.
If Cardano now holds $0,.212 as support, the price could gain by 11% and reach $0.235. The ADX line that is tipping north suggests that the uptrend is strong, and this move to $0.235 could occur.
ADA/USDT 4H Chart (Source: TradingView) Still, concerns about the Fed hiking rates again in 2026 could increase the selling pressure. If this occurs, Cardano price could drop to retest the support at $0.19.
ADA Futures Activity Heats Up as CME Volumes Hit 3-Week High Data from CME shows that Cardano’s volumes have risen to 7 million ADA, with this being the highest volume numbers seen since August 26.
The CME open interest has also jumped to 178 ADA contracts, with this also being the highest CME reading in September.
Cardano Volumes/OI (Source: CME) The rising CME volumes and open interest suggest that speculative demand for Cardano by institutional players is rising
Cardano’s open interest on CoinGlass had also risen by 9% to $466 million at the time of writing. The weighted funding rate had also jumped to 0.0098%. This suggests that long buyers are paying more to keep their positions open.
Cardano vybral mezi 1. zářím 2025 a 1. zářím 2026 jen 3,3 milionu ADA na poplatcích, zatímco stakingové odměny dosáhly 493,7 milionu ADA. Poplatky tak pokryly jen asi 0,67 % výplat.
New on-chain data has put a hard number on one of Cardano's most debated long-term questions: can network fees ever carry a meaningful share of staking rewards?
According to an analysis by blockchain data provider Bitquery, Cardano collected 3.3 million $ADA in transaction fees across 73 epochs between September 1, 2025 and September 1, 2026. Over the same period, the network distributed 493.7 million ADA in staking rewards. The result: fees accounted for roughly 0.67% of total reward payouts, or about one ADA in fees for every 150 ADA paid out to stakers.
Reserve Emissions Still DominateThe shortfall is not a bug in Cardano's design, at least not yet. The treasury takes 20% of that pot, with the remainder distributed to stake pools based on performance. The reserve is deliberately structured to shrink over time.
The problem is that fees have not grown fast enough to offset declining reserve emissions. A snapshot of epoch 654 illustrates the scale of the challenge: 108,500 transactions generated just 33,855 ADA in fees across five days, equivalent to around 21,700 transactions per day and 0.251 transactions per second. Fees in that single epoch covered only 0.339% of the roughly 9.998 million ADA distributed in rewards.
Daily transaction volumes tell a similarly sobering story. Cardano averaged 90,294 transactions per day in 2022. From January through August 2026, that figure dropped to 24,869, a decline of more than 72%, according to Bitquery's count.
The Path to Fee SustainabilityCardano's original economic design anticipated this transition. That handoff has not yet materialised at the volumes required.
Planned protocol upgrades could expand the network's capacity. However,
Organic demand from decentralised applications, DeFi, and everyday users will ultimately determine whether fee income can close the shortfall. For now, the numbers are stark: 3.3 million ADA in fees against 493.7 million ADA in rewards. The reserve continues to shrink each epoch. Growing on-chain activity is not just a metric worth watching. It is increasingly central to Cardano's economic future.
Sources:
CryptoSlate: Cardano fees covered just 0.7% of staking rewards as transactions fall 72%
Input Output: Cardano is ready to grow. Leios is how it gets there.
Cardano Docs: Monetary Policy
Cardano Foundation se připojila k Mastercard Crypto Partner Programu v rámci tracku zaměřeného na blockchainy. Spolupráce se má týkat přeshraničních plateb, B2B transakcí a vypořádání.
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In a major milestone, the Cardano Foundation has joined Mastercard's Crypto Partner Program.
As part of its Blockchains track, the Cardano Foundation will engage with Mastercard and other participants working across payments and stablecoins on areas including cross-border money movement, B2B transactions, and settlement.
The Cardano Foundation highlighted this significant milestone in an X post, describing it as another step toward connecting public blockchain infrastructure with the way money moves globally.
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Connecting Cardano with the future of global payments.
The Cardano Foundation has joined Mastercard’s Crypto Partner Program.
As part of its Blockchains track, we’ll engage with Mastercard and other participants working across payments and stablecoins on areas including… pic.twitter.com/eeZ6K2UrPY
— Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF) September 15, 2026 In a separate milestone, Cardano's agentic economy has seen significant progress: through Masumi, Cardano is now officially integrated into the x402 repository and its official packages, which makes it easier than ever for AI agents to transact on Cardano.
With Cardano now officially part of the x402 codebase as a working implementation, the integration enables x402 payments on Cardano, supported across mainnet, preprod, and preview testnet. This remains in line with Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson's vision on agentic finance.
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Hoskinson discussed the confluence of AI agents, blockchain, privacy, and digital finance at the 2026 Wyoming Blockchain Symposium and why he thinks agentic systems can bring the next billion users to crypto.
Hoskinson explained why the next era of finance, commerce, and search might increasingly be agentic and how blockchain could provide the privacy, identity, payments, and control layers that AI agents need.
Cardano scaling upgrade makes remarkable progressCardano developers are ready to showcase Leios node peaking at 250 TxkB/s (~1,000 simple 250-byte transactions per second) on a local cluster with emulated round trip times for higher fidelity. For comparison, Cardano mainnet currently tops at 4.5 TxkB/s.
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Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson praises the potential of Leios with expectations of it arriving on the Cardano mainnet by the end of 2026.
According to Input Output's Product Manager, Carlos Lopez de Lara, he highlights massive potential, saying, "The throughput is there; the work ahead sits in the network stack, where tuning and optimisation will carry these numbers out of the lab and into real internet conditions. Cardano, beast mode enabled."
Cardano získalo nativní podporu v oficiálním kódu x402, takže vývojáři mohou používat Cardano v tomto otevřeném platebním protokolu. Integrace pokrývá mainnet, preprod i preview.
Cardano has scored a significant payments integration after receiving native support in the official x402 codebase.
The implementation, contributed by Cardano Foundation engineers, brings Cardano directly into the open payment protocol's reference tooling.
This means developers building x402-based applications and AI agents can now use Cardano through the same standardized infrastructure available for other supported networks.
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The integration includes client, server, and facilitator components as well as working examples, with support covering Cardano mainnet, preprod, and preview.
What it meansx402 is an open payments protocol originally developed by Coinbase. It uses HTTP's long-dormant "402 Payment Required" status code to allow applications to request and make payments directly over the internet.
In simple terms, a service can tell another application or AI agent that access costs a certain amount.
The system is particularly relevant to autonomous AI agents since they can pay for APIs, data, computing resources, or other digital services.
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Cardano-based x402 payments were already possible through third-party projects such as Masumi. The new implementation, however, has been incorporated into the official x402 codebase.
This substantially lowers the barrier for developers who want to use Cardano as a settlement network.
It also makes Cardano easier to include alongside other supported networks in multi-chain applications.
Benefits for CardanoThe integration could potentially expand the number of applications capable of accepting payments settled on Cardano.
Developers building x402 applications no longer have to start with an independent Cardano implementation. Native support provides standardized client and server components as well as examples that can be used as a starting point.
Interoperability is another advantage. Given that x402 is designed to be network- and currency-agnostic, applications can support several payment networks while maintaining a common HTTP-based payment flow.
The development comes as x402 continues to gain support from major cryptocurrency and payments companies.
In July, the x402 Foundation launched with support from dozens of organizations, including Amazon Web Services, American Express, Circle, Coinbase, Google, Mastercard, Ripple, Shopify, Solana Foundation, Stellar Development Foundation, Stripe and Visa.
SecondFI připravuje nástroj na obnovu majetku po červnovém hacku za 2 miliony USD. Před veřejným spuštěním nechává technologii i smart contract projít nezávislými audity.
SecondFI, a self-custody neofinance platform, has come up with an asset recovery tool after the $2 million exploit that happened in the month of June. The tool is designed to allow users affected by its security incident to recover their assets.
However, the tool is not in full swing yet, as the company is taking a staged approach to make sure the recovery mechanism itself is secure before releasing it publicly.
What’s SecondFI’s plan of action? For this, SecondFi has commissioned an independent security review of the technology behind it and plans to conduct another audit of the smart contract that will ultimately handle the recovery process.
But before this, SecondFi had already identified that the 374 Cardano wallet exploit was caused by a deterministic nonce derivation flaw in its software signer.
This allowed attackers to mathematically reconstruct private keys from public blockchain data after affected addresses signed transactions.
How is zkSecurity helping SecondFi? On the 3rd of August 2026, SecondFi hired zkSecurity to independently audit its proof-tool repository. The repository uses zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs) that allow an affected user to prove that they control a particular Cardano [ADA] wallet credential.
The interesting part here is that the user can prove their control without revealing their seed phrase, private key, or wallet derivation path.
Additionally, the system is optimized to run directly in a web browser. As a result, it allows users to generate proofs locally instead of sending sensitive wallet information to a remote server.
Issues identified and fixed As of now, according to the audit report, zkSecurity has identified two high-severity issues in upstream code. Notably, SecondFi has fixed both the issues. Meanwhile, zkSecurity has also reviewed and tested the fixes, confirming they have been resolved.
At the same time, the audit also found two low-severity issues in SecondFi’s own repository, which remain open but were assessed as not practically exploitable.
While these issues have not been fixed yet, the findings do not necessarily mean the recovery tool is unsafe.
That said, SecondFi expects the asset recovery tool to be launched in the coming weeks. However, this solely depends on the completion of the recovery smart contract audit and final production checks.
Final Summary SecondFi has commissioned an independent security review of the technology behind it. The firm also hired zkSecurity to independently audit its proof-tool repository.
Cardano spustilo bezpečnostní upgrade Hydra 2.4.1, který opravuje zranitelnost umožňující krádež prostředků. IOG vyzvalo uzly na verzích 2.3.0 a 2.4.0 k aktualizaci.
Cardano (ADA) price is up by 2% today, September 12, to trade at $0.208 at the time of writing, with the gains mirroring an uptrend across the broader crypto market.
Bitcoin (BTC) had gained to $77,300 while Ethereum (ETH) had rallied to $2,530, with the total market cap reaching $2.65 trillion.
Cardano’s gains also coincide with a security upgrade on the network despite falling usage.
Cardano Completes Hydra 2.4.1 Upgrade In a recent post on X, the Input Output Group noted that it has released the Hydra 2.4.1 security upgrade on Cardano and urged network users who were using previous releases to upgrade.
The Hydra 2.4.1 upgrade patched a fund-stealing vulnerability on Cardano that previously allowed malicious users within a Hydra Head to submit invalid transactions before stealing funds.
With Hydra 2.4.1, each transaction will be fully validated, which is why the IOG is urging operators running on nodes 2.3.0 and 2.4.0 to upgrade.
The Hydra upgrade comes after Cardano released the latest version of node 11.1.1 ahead of the Dijkstra hard fork, as previously reported by CoinGape. This fork will improve the network’s speed capability.
Network Activity Weakens as TVL Drops Below 300M ADA Data from DeFiLlama shows that the Total Value Locked (TVL) on Cardano has dropped below 300 million ADA despite ongoing upgrades on the network.
The number of active addresses had also dropped to 12,204 at the time of writing, per data from DeFiLlama. This is the lowest count for active addresses since August 17.
Cardano TVL & Active Addresses (Source: DeFiLlama) However, the DEX volumes have increased slightly from $1.13 million to $1.65 million. Still, these DEX volumes remain below the September high of $7.28 million.
Cardano’s Futures Activity Shows Mixed Sentiment Data from CoinGlass shows the sentiment towards the value of Cardano. Retail traders are bullish on ADA price because the long/shory reading on Binance and OKX sits at 1.89 and 2.18, respectively. Bybit has the highest long/short reading of 2.53.
However, while the accounts of large traders on Binance and Bybit and “extremely bullish” on Cardano price, the same cohort on OKX remains bearish.
ADA Long/Short Positioning (Source: CoinGlass) The smart money sentiment for Cardano on Binance and Bybit is also “extremely bearish,” while on OKX, the smart money sentiment is “extremely bullish.”
Cardano Price Defends Key Support as Double Bottom Emerges The price of Cardano has bounced from the support at $0.021. The move above this support has also created a double bottom pattern that supports a bullish future Cardano price outlook.
However, Cardano price will confirm the bullish outlook of this double bottom if the price closes above the resistance at $0.229. Still, Cardano will need to close above the 200-day EMA of $0.241 to confirm that the long-term forecast is bullish.
If this bullish thesis fails, ADA could drop to the 50-day EMA of $0.199.
ADA/USDT 1D Chart (Source: TradingView) The MACD line that is positive suggests that the momentum is still favoring bulls. However, the histogram bars that are red and negative suggest that these bulls might be losing their grip on price.
Cardano (ADA) za posledních 24 hodin kleslo o 1,64 % na 0,20 USD. Za stejnou dobu bylo zlikvidováno asi 2,06 milionu USD pozic, z toho 1,89 milionu USD longů.
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Cardano (ADA) experienced a 1,085% liquidation imbalance after continued selling forced long traders who were betting on a price increase out of leveraged positions.
At the time of writing, Cardano was down 1.64% in the last 24 hours to $0.20, with its price drop catching traders betting on an increase off guard.
About $2.06 million of leveraged Cardano positions were liquidated over the past 24 hours, with $1.89 million coming from long positions and $174,080 from shorts, according to CoinGlass data. The percentage imbalance between long and short positions yields 1,085%.
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Growing expectations that the Fed might raise interest rates alongside renewed inflation concerns had triggered a selloff in the markets, with Cardano falling in tandem.
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Cardano fell for four straight days in the week from September 7 to 10, 2026 eventually touching a low of $0.20 early Friday, from where it rebounded. U.S. inflation data in August came in broadly in line with estimates. Also on Thursday, August 2026 wholesale inflation report showed prices rose 0.4% last month, in line with consensus estimates.
The Consumer Price Index rose 0.4% in August 2026, in line with economists' forecasts of 0.4% and July's 0.1% increase. The report is the final major inflation indicator the Fed will see before it holds its policy meeting next week.
Cardano upgrades gain tractionDijkstra preparations continue; Node 11.2 integration is underway and will provide the foundation for early Dijkstra testing.
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Cardano-node-11.1.1 is soon to be mainnet-ready and is tagged as a Dijkstra Pre-Release. This release removes the V1 LedgerDB and the LMDB storage backend and makes ledger snapshots predictable and Mithril-compatible, so snapshots are comparable and shareable across nodes.
Integration of 11.2 is already underway and expected to complete within the next few weeks, bringing the Dijkstra feature set, including the new block format, but without Leios. While 11.2 should not be considered capable of surviving the hard fork event, it will enable early Dijkstra testing and downstream tooling integration, with a dedicated public testnet "DijkstraNet" being made available for this purpose.
Critical-path readiness is also expanding beyond the node, with Dolos and Pallas identified among the important dependencies.
Hydra 2.4.1 was also released this week while DevX Cardano-init open beta ships, the first Plu-ts stable release is out, and the Leios prototype was significantly improved.
Mesh vydal jednotné SDK pro peněženky ADA a BTC, které vývojářům umožňuje vytvářet aplikace napříč Cardanem i Bitcoinem. Projekt byl financován v rámci Catalyst Fund 14 a jeho rozpočet činil 100 000 ADA; dosud z něj bylo uvolněno 76 000 ADA.
@meshsdk has shipped a combined $ADA and $BTC wallet SDK, giving developers a unified interface for building across both the Cardano and Bitcoin networks. The release, funded through Cardano's community grant programme Project Catalyst, marks a meaningful step in cross-chain developer tooling from one of the ecosystem's most active open-source teams.
What the SDK Includes The new wallet extension builds on that foundation by adding Bitcoin support through a single developer interface. The package includes headless wallets, Bitcoin primitives for address and script handling that mirror those already familiar to Cardano developers, and full support for transaction and data signing across both chains. All code is released under the Apache 2.0 licence, with documentation published publicly.
On the Cardano side,
Catalyst Fund 14 Funding and Milestones The work sits under Mesh's Catalyst Fund 14 proposal, budgeted at 100,000 ADA. Four of the five milestones have received approved proof of achievement, with the fifth currently awaiting closeout. A total of 76,000 ADA has been released to date.
For developers already working with Mesh on Cardano, the Bitcoin extension lowers the cost of building multi-chain applications considerably, removing the need to maintain separate toolchains for each network.
Sources:
Mesh SDK: About
Project Catalyst: All Funds
AlphaGrowth spustila Cardano PRIME, program s cílem vytvořit z každého 1 USD grantu 50 USD v udržitelném TVL na Cardanu. ADA mezitím obchoduje za 0,2091 USD, za posledních 24 hodin klesla o 1,32 %.
Cardano’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem is drawing new attention with the launch of Cardano PRIME, a program spearheaded by AlphaGrowth to stimulate network development and liquidity. As of today, the ADA token trades at $0.2091, reflecting a 1.32% decline over the last 24 hours.
AlphaGrowth’s Cardano PRIME InitiativeAlphaGrowth, a company focused on fostering blockchain ecosystem growth, has opened submissions for Cardano PRIME. This program aims to identify gaps in Cardano’s DeFi infrastructure and incentivize teams to create the missing infrastructure and products that can attract both capital and activity to the network.
According to AlphaGrowth, “the goal is for every $1 of grant funding to support $50 of sustained TVL on Cardano.” This explicit target shifts the focus from growing the sheer number of projects to ensuring those projects deliver tangible, ongoing value within the network.
AlphaGrowth has indicated that its mission is to fill crucial holes in Cardano’s DeFi ecosystem by rewarding developers and teams capable of bolstering liquidity, user activity, and lasting growth for the network.
Cardanians, a Cardano-focused community, emphasized the importance of this initiative on X, describing it as an opportunity for experienced developers to make a significant impact on the direction of Cardano’s DeFi sector.
The long-term success of Cardano PRIME will likely depend on whether the projects supported with grants can drive real user engagement and liquidity inflows, turning funding into sustained on-chain activity.
Mini dictionary: AlphaGrowth, a blockchain accelerator and advisory firm, works with blockchain ecosystems to design growth strategies and launch support programs for projects building on networks like Cardano.
Technical Levels and Network MetricsTradingView data shows that ADA is currently below its 50-day moving average of $0.2177, while the 200-day moving average sits at $0.1939. This positions ADA between two crucial technical thresholds: reclaiming $0.2177 would help confirm bullish momentum, whereas dropping toward or under $0.1939 would signal a more defensive outlook for the token.
Technical IndicatorCurrent ValuePrice$0.209150-day Moving Average$0.2177200-day Moving Average$0.1939RSI52.07RSI Moving Avg55.20Total Value Locked (TVL)~$60 millionThe Relative Strength Index (RSI) stands at 52.07 versus a moving average of 55.20, keeping ADA’s momentum in a neutral range. The RSI below its moving average suggests buyers have yet to establish strong short-term momentum.
SoSoValue reports Cardano’s total value locked at around $60 million, though this metric has seen fluctuations recently. The same dashboard also monitors active addresses and transaction counts, indicating broader activity trends on the network.
Derivatives Data and Market DynamicsCoinglass data shows Cardano’s open interest at approximately $440 million, down from a recent high of $580 million in August. This indicates that a significant volume of derivative trades remains open, adding to short-term price sensitivity. Moves above $0.2177 or below $0.1939 could trigger stronger reactions from traders as these key levels come into play.
Liquidity and sustained on-chain activity remain the decisive measures for Cardano’s DeFi growth, making AlphaGrowth’s targeted approach to ecosystem development particularly relevant at this stage.
Assessing the Broader ImpactAlphaGrowth’s Cardano PRIME is seen as a step toward strengthening the broader ecosystem by focusing on infrastructure and products directly linked to network liquidity and activity, rather than project quantity alone. The initiative’s $1-for-$50 TVL target means that any measurable impact will be judged by on-chain growth, not just developer engagement or marketing efforts.
If projects funded by Cardano PRIME successfully increase TVL and active participation, the underlying network fundamentals could improve, offering ADA holders and potential investors stronger reasons to take interest in Cardano. Until then, most traders appear cautious, with technical data pointing to a neutral stance and derivative activity sustaining volatility.
For now, the technical focus is on whether ADA can reclaim its 50-day average at $0.2177 for positive momentum, or whether continued weakness could lead to losses below the 200-day mark at $0.1939. AlphaGrowth’s progress in turning its funding strategy into active projects will determine the longer-term impact for Cardano’s DeFi future.
Vývojáři Cardana představili ODATANO, nástroj pro propojení SAP s blockchainem přes standardní OData V4 API. Projekt už nabízí 31 entit a funkcí včetně čtení dat, vytváření i podepisování transakcí.
Developers in the Cardano ecosystem have introduced a new tool called ODATANO, aimed at facilitating integration between SAP, one of the world’s largest enterprise software ecosystems, and the Cardano blockchain.
SAP is known as an enterprise resource planning and business software platform that enables companies to manage core business processes such as finance, accounting, supply chain, human resources, production, and customer management through a single enterprise software infrastructure, and is used by numerous large companies worldwide.
In an interview published on the Cardano developer portal, ODATANO founder Maximilian explained that the project abstracts the Cardano blockchain infrastructure behind a standard OData V4 API, allowing enterprise developers familiar with the SAP development environment to integrate Cardano without learning the technical details of blockchain technology.
According to Maximilian, a traditional SAP developer needs to learn many blockchain concepts such as the UTxO model, transaction creation, CBOR serialization, transaction fee calculation, collateral mechanisms, and key management in order to directly integrate with Cardano. ODATANO, on the other hand, packages these complex processes within a service layer, allowing Cardano to connect to SAP applications like a standard OData service. The project currently offers 31 different entities and functions, including data reading, transaction creation, and signing. Blocks, addresses, UTxOs, entities, and protocol parameters can be queried through the system, while transactions can be created, signed, and sent to the Cardano network. ODATANO can also be run as an SAP CAP plugin or installed as a standalone service.
Several reference applications, including TRACE, QUANTIX, FINCA, and x402, have been developed using the ODATANO infrastructure. QUANTIX stands out as a B2B raw material procurement and payment application utilizing oracle data, and the project won the 2026 Charli3 Oracle Hackathon. According to the Cardano developer portal, ODATANO is currently funded under the Cardano Catalyst Fund 14.
*This is not investment advice.
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Cardano vydává node 11.1.1 jako první ze čtyř milníků pro hard fork Dijkstra. Aktualizace odstraňuje starý tracing, řeší známé problémy kolem Genesisu a také zvýšené využití paměti zjištěné při testování node 11.1.0.
Cardano released node version 11.1.1 ahead of its next major network era, completing the first of four planned node milestones supporting the Dijkstra hard fork.
Summary
Cardano node 11.1.1 has shipped, removing legacy tracing and addressing known Genesis-related operational issues. Node 11.2 will open most Dijkstra features for testing while excluding Leios consensus components initially. DijkstraNet is expected after node 11.2 for Plutus V4, nested transactions and CIP-50 testing publicly. Intersect’s moderate-confidence hard-fork window runs December 5 through January 4, pending readiness and governance approval. Peras remains planned for a separate intra-era hard fork during the second quarter of 2027. Intersect’s container registry shows that version 11.1.1 was published during the weekend ending Sept. 6. The release removes Cardano’s legacy tracing system and addresses known Genesis-related issues. It also responds to increased memory use identified during testing of node 11.1.0.
The maintenance release arrived as Intersect published a more detailed Dijkstra schedule. Node versions 11.2 and 11.3, followed by the final protocol version 12 release, will progressively introduce the code required for testing and mainnet activation.
Intersect currently places a possible Dijkstra enactment between Dec. 5, 2026, and Jan. 4, 2027, under its “moderate confidence” timeline. A later “high confidence” window runs from Feb. 24 to March 26, 2027.
Those windows remain estimates. Cardano must complete development, public testing, ecosystem preparation and on-chain governance before the hard fork can activate.
Cardano node 11.1.1 begins the release sequence Node 11.1.1 is available through Intersect’s official GitHub container registry. Intersect had previously targeted the week beginning Sept. 7, meaning the package appeared slightly ahead of that stated window.
The release does not activate the Dijkstra era or introduce the full set of planned ledger features. It is a maintenance and preparation update intended for current mainnet use.
Version 11.1.1 removes the older tracing infrastructure used to monitor node operations. Cardano’s development reporting also said it would address higher resident memory use observed in node 11.1.0 benchmarks.
The release registry includes standard, AMD64 and ARM64 versions. Availability across different processor architectures is relevant for stake pool operators and developers running Cardano infrastructure on varied hardware.
Node 11.2 is the next planned milestone. Intersect expects it within about one month of its Sept. 5 update. The version will contain most of the Dijkstra feature set for testing, but it will not be the final hard-fork candidate.
Leios components will be absent from node 11.2 because they primarily concern consensus and block production. Developers should still be able to test the remaining Dijkstra ledger and transaction features.
DijkstraNet will test Cardano’s new transaction features Intersect plans to launch a public network called DijkstraNet after node 11.2 becomes available. The testnet will let developers, stake pool operators and tooling providers test the broader protocol version 12 feature set.
DijkstraNet is expected to include Plutus V4, Nested Transactions and CIP-50 parameters. Other ledger changes tracked in Cardano’s public development repository include new script types, address changes, block-body serialization revisions and changes to reward withdrawals.
Nested Transactions would allow one Cardano transaction to contain other transactions while preserving separate validation conditions. This structure could support more complex applications, coordinated actions and multi-party workflows without requiring every step to operate as an unrelated transaction.
Plutus V4 represents the next version of Cardano’s smart-contract language and execution environment. Testing will be needed to confirm that wallets, decentralized applications, indexers and developer tools correctly interpret the new ledger rules.
CIP-50 concerns pledge leverage and staking rewards. Its inclusion means stake pool operators will need to examine how new parameters could affect incentives and pool economics before mainnet activation.
The official Dijkstra readiness tracker remains open and marked as work in progress. It will close only after developers prepare a node capable of completing the hard fork into a functional Dijkstra era.
DijkstraNet will operate alongside MusashiNet rather than replacing it. MusashiNet is already live and concentrates on Leios, consensus and block-production testing.
This separation allows ledger features and the new consensus architecture to progress in parallel. Results must eventually converge in the node version selected as the hard-fork candidate.
Node 11.3 will combine Dijkstra with Linear Leios Cardano node 11.3 is expected within one to two months, according to Intersect’s Sept. 5 update. It is intended to become the Dijkstra hard-fork release candidate.
Unlike node 11.2, version 11.3 is expected to contain the full Dijkstra feature set, including Linear Leios. It should also be capable of crossing from the current Conway ledger era into Dijkstra during test-network rehearsals.
What does Dijkstra ask of you now?
Good news, there is time to find out and prepare
properly.
Weekly Update #127: inc the node roadmap, what SPOs, developers and DReps can do now, and more…https://t.co/quIAO5zMU0
— Intersect (@IntersectMBO) September 7, 2026 Linear Leios is Cardano’s planned first-stage implementation of Ouroboros Leios. It adds parallel transaction-processing structures around the existing Praos consensus design. The goal is to increase throughput without replacing the security assumptions of Cardano’s base chain.
Testing must examine more than raw transaction capacity. Developers need to evaluate block propagation, network bandwidth, resource use, synchronization, recovery behavior and performance under adverse conditions.
Cardano node 12.0 will become the definitive protocol version 12 release under the project’s naming convention. Intersect has not assigned a publication date.
Intersect described the December-to-January period as a “moderate confidence” window, not a guaranteed activation date.
The organization’s later window, running from Feb. 24 to March 26, allows more time for testing and governance if the earlier schedule cannot be met. Neither window is a fixed hard-fork date.
As previously reported when Cardano published its phased Dijkstra roadmap, the year-end target originally referred partly to code completion. Mainnet activation remains conditional on technical readiness and community approval.
Governance must approve Cardano’s Dijkstra hard fork Cardano cannot activate Dijkstra solely through a software release. The network’s on-chain governance system must approve the constitutional and hard-fork actions required for protocol version 12.
Some new Dijkstra parameters need to be incorporated into the Cardano Constitution’s guardrails before governance can modify them. Intersect has asked participants to monitor its Constitutional Amendment Portal for related proposals.
A constitutional change requires approval under Cardano’s governance rules. A separate hard-fork initiation action must then obtain the required support from delegated representatives, stake pool operators and the Constitutional Committee.
This process was tested during the van Rossem hard fork. As crypto.news reported following its July activation, van Rossem moved Cardano to protocol version 11 after completing the network’s full on-chain approval process.
Van Rossem remained within the Conway era but added Plutus changes and prepared technical foundations for Dijkstra. It was Cardano’s first mainnet hard fork enacted entirely through the current governance framework.
The Dijkstra transition will be broader because it changes the ledger era and introduces more extensive consensus, transaction and smart-contract capabilities. Exchanges, wallets, explorers and decentralized applications must be ready before activation.
Intersect is encouraging stake pool operators and developers to join MusashiNet and DijkstraNet testing. It has also scheduled node-diversity workshops in Singapore on Oct. 6 and London on Nov. 13 and 14.
Amaru, an alternative Cardano node written in Rust, forms another part of that preparation. It can already validate and synchronize with the chain tip, while mainnet block production remains targeted for November 2026.
Node diversity could reduce the network’s reliance on a single Haskell implementation. It also creates another testing requirement because alternative clients must interpret the protocol rules consistently.
Peras remains a separate 2027 upgrade Cardano’s Dijkstra plan has two phases. Phase 1 covers the era transition, Nested Transactions and Linear Leios. Developers are targeting mainnet readiness around the end of 2026, subject to testing and governance.
Phase 2 will activate Ouroboros Peras through a separate intra-era hard fork. Intersect currently targets the second quarter of 2027.
Peras adds stake-based voting on recent chain tips to accelerate settlement. The design aims to provide stronger confirmation sooner than relying only on the normal chain-depth rules of Ouroboros Praos.
Phase 1 will install some of the codecs and protocol parameters needed for Peras. It will not activate the finality mechanism itself. Peras will require its own testnet deployments, readiness checks and governance action.
No verified ADA price movement could be attributed solely to the node release or Intersect’s revised windows. The roadmap provides measurable technical milestones, but the final activation date remains dependent on development and governance.
The next checkpoints are the adoption of node 11.1.1, release of node 11.2, public opening of DijkstraNet and publication of the required constitutional amendments. Node 11.3 will then determine whether Cardano is technically ready to rehearse the full era transition.
FAQs What is the Cardano Dijkstra hard fork? Dijkstra is Cardano’s planned transition to protocol version 12. It will introduce a new ledger era, Nested Transactions, Plutus V4 changes and Linear Leios.
Has Cardano node 11.1.1 been released? Yes. Intersect’s official GitHub package registry shows version 11.1.1 was published before the week beginning Sept. 7.
When will DijkstraNet launch? Intersect expects DijkstraNet after node 11.2. The node is targeted within about one month of the organization’s Sept. 5 update.
When will Cardano activate Dijkstra? Intersect’s earlier estimated window runs from Dec. 5, 2026, to Jan. 4, 2027. Its higher-confidence window runs from Feb. 24 to March 26, 2027. Neither is guaranteed.
Is Peras included in the first Dijkstra hard fork? No. Phase 1 will prepare some required structures, but Peras activation is planned through another hard fork in the second quarter of 2027.
Cardano Foundation a Blockforce zaznamenaly na Cardanu přes 500 000 záznamů o dodavatelském řetězci. Systém běží v produkci pro velké brazilské módní skupiny.
A Dual-Ledger Approach to Supply Chain VerificationThe Cardano Foundation (@Cardano_CF) and Brazilian technology firm Blockforce have put Cardano to work as the public proof layer in an enterprise supply chain platform, with more than 500,000 records already anchored on-chain. The system is live in production, not a pilot, and is currently operating with some of Brazil's largest fashion groups.
The architecture is built around a clear separation between confidentiality and verifiability. Sensitive commercial information, including supplier identities, contract terms, and production volumes, stays on that permissioned network.
This matters because the two obvious alternatives both fall short. A fully private database protects commercial secrets but gives no outsider a way to independently verify anything. A fully public ledger provides verifiability but exposes pricing and supplier relationships to anyone watching the chain. Blockforce's setup sidesteps both problems.
Cost Engineering and the Road AheadScaling a proof-anchoring system to enterprise volumes requires keeping per-record costs manageable. The published architecture processes up to 44 certificates per transaction, with each certificate remaining individually verifiable. That figure comes from the project partners and has not been independently audited.
The company uses supplier, fiscal, and government database records to build each traceable record before it is proofed and anchored.
Sources:
Cardano Foundation: Blockforce Partnership Case Study
Crypto.news: Cardano Anchors 500,000 Supply Chain Records
CoinTurk: Cardano Anchors Over 500,000 Brazilian Supply Chain Records
Cardano směřuje k Dijkstra upgradu: první fáze má na Mainnet dorazit do konce roku 2026, druhá (Peras) ve 2. čtvrtletí 2027. Intersect očekává po vydání node 11.2 veřejný DijkstraNet pro testování a čtyři hlavní node releasy v nejbližších měsících.
Cover image via U.Today Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. The financial and market information provided on U.Today is intended for informational purposes only. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. Conduct your own research by contacting financial experts before making any investment decisions. We believe that all content is accurate as of the date of publication, but certain offers mentioned may no longer be available.
Cardano is entering a potentially important stretch of development, with the Dijkstra era moving toward key milestones in the months ahead.
The initial Dijkstra rollout is planned in two phases, introducing Linear Leios with Nested Transactions and Peras, respectively. The current objective is to deliver Phase 1 (Nested Transactions and Linear Leios) to Mainnet by the end of 2026, providing an incremental rollout of key Dijkstra capabilities, with Phase 2 (Peras) to be activated in an intra-era hard fork in Q2 2027.
According to Intersect, work toward the Dijkstra era hard fork continues to advance across node development, ecosystem readiness, and downstream tooling. In a recent report, Intersect highlighted what to keep an eye on in the months ahead.
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What does Dijkstra ask of you now?
Good news, there is time to find out and prepare
properly.
Weekly Update #127: inc the node roadmap, what SPOs, developers and DReps can do now, and more...https://t.co/quIAO5zMU0
— Intersect (@IntersectMBO) September 7, 2026 Upcoming Haskell node releases will unlock early Dijkstra functionality for testing, with four major node releases anticipated over the coming months.
Anticipated timelinesCardano-node-11.1.1 is expected early, by September 7, for Mainnet usage. This node release removes the legacy tracing system and fixes known Genesis issues.
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Expected in less than a month, Cardano-node-11.2 will contain the Dijkstra feature set, ready for testing, but will not be the hard fork release candidate.
This node release will not contain the Leios elements, as these are largely limited to consensus and block production, but this should not impact testing and development against all other Dijkstra features.
Cardano-node-11.3 is targeted as the hard fork release candidate, capable of crossing the hard fork and containing all Dijkstra functionality, including Leios, and is anticipated in the next one to two months.
Cardano-node-12.0, according to its naming convention, will be the definitive hard fork node release, with its launch timeline not yet determined.
In order to begin testing and development of the Dijkstra feature set, including Plutus V4, Nested Transactions, and CIP-50 (Cardano Improvement Proposals), there will be a publicly available "DijkstraNet," following the release of node 11.2.
DijkstraNet will run in parallel to MusashiNet, which will continue to test and evaluate Leios development alongside the Dijkstra feature set being implemented on DijkstraNet.
Dates for two planned node diversity workshops are given as Singapore (TOKEN2049), October 6, and London, November 13–14.
Governance participants can monitor planned Dijkstra-related constitutional amendments to be publicly proposed. Following a recalibration of the technical delivery plan, the current moderate confidence window places potential Dijkstra hard fork enactment between December 5, 2026 and January 4, 2027 while the high confidence window runs from February 24, 2027 to March 26, 2027.
Cardano za posledních 7 dní vzrostlo o 17 % a velcí držitelé přikoupili 60 milionů ADA. Objem na DEX v síti se za 48 hodin ztrojnásobil z 2,01 milionu USD na 7,28 milionu USD.
Cardano (ADA) traded near $0.224 on Friday, marking a strong week of upward movement following gains across major support levels. The digital asset climbed 17% over the past seven days, supported by growing on-chain activity and a surge in purchases by large wallet holders.
Analysts see breakout potentialTechnical analysts on X have turned positive on ADA’s price potential. One market commentator projected that Cardano could rally as high as $2.92—representing nearly 14 times its current value—if bullish momentum persists. This optimistic outlook follows ADA’s continued testing of key resistance areas throughout the week.
Commentator Sssebi shared their views on social media, stating that ADA’s persistence at resistance levels increases the probability of a breakout. As ADA traded within these zones, Sssebi emphasized the coin’s resilience and ongoing optimism among traders.
$ADA is showing persistence at resistance levels. The longer it remains in this range, the greater the potential for a breakout, according to market observers.
DEX activity and on-chain data signal growthBlockchain analytics provider DeFiLlama reported a dramatic surge in decentralized exchange (DEX) trading on the Cardano network. Within a 48-hour period, trading volumes soared from $2.01 million to $7.28 million, signaling heightened user engagement and investor interest.
Santiment, an analytics firm specializing in blockchain data, indicated that Cardano wallets holding between 1 million and 10 million ADA collectively purchased an additional 60 million tokens starting Sunday. This wave of accumulation from large holders provided consistent upward price pressure during the week.
The total value locked (TVL) in Cardano’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem increased notably as well, rising from 268.47 million ADA on August 28 to 299.81 million ADA. The blockchain is also set to integrate DeFi platform RealFi on October 1, aiming to further expand its decentralized finance offerings.
Mini dictionary: RealFi, short for “Real Finance,” is a DeFi platform that aims to connect real-world assets and financial activities to blockchain-based decentralized protocols.
Derivative market analytics from CoinGlass showed a long-to-short ratio of 1.10 for ADA, approaching the month’s high. Futures funding rates turned positive at 0.0087% on Friday, reflecting an overall bullish bias among leveraged traders.
MetricValueChange/TimeframePrice (ADA)$0.224+17% past 7 daysDEX Volume$7.28 millionTripled in 48 hoursLarge Holder Accumulation60 million ADASince SundayTVL299.81 million ADAIncrease of 31 million ADA since Aug 28Long/Short Ratio1.10Highest in a monthFunding Rate0.0087%FridayTechnical indicators show bullish setupCardano is trading above both its 50-day and 100-day exponential moving averages (EMA), although it remains slightly below the 200-day EMA. The relative strength index (RSI) stands at 64, suggesting firm bullish momentum without entering overbought territory. The MACD technical indicator recently crossed into mildly positive territory as well.
Key resistance is identified at the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement near $0.231 and $0.236, while the 200-day EMA stands at around $0.245. Immediate support lies at $0.213 with additional stability provided by the 100-day EMA at $0.198.
Despite positive breadth in multiple metrics, total stablecoin market capitalization on Cardano has contracted slightly from $67.95 million to $63.97 million, according to DeFiLlama.
ADA is currently above mid-term moving averages, but technical analysts highlight ongoing resistance near $0.231 as a key marker for future momentum.
Continued accumulation by large holders, combined with rising DEX activity and a favorable derivatives outlook, has contributed to positive sentiment throughout the Cardano ecosystem.
Disclaimer: The information contained in this article does not constitute investment advice. Investors should be aware that cryptocurrencies carry high volatility and therefore risk, and should conduct their own research.
Cardano Foundation se stala prvním kryptoprojektem, jehož účetní závěrku za rok 2025 ověřil Grant Thornton přímo na blockchainu Cardano. Auditor tak poprvé zapsal formální attestaci na blockchain.
Blockchain organizations have promised transparency for years. The Cardano Foundation just put an auditor’s signature on-chain to prove it.
Grant Thornton Switzerland has attested the Cardano Foundation’s 2025 financial statements directly on the Cardano blockchain, making this the first time an independent auditor has placed a formal attestation on-chain for a major crypto organization. The audit opinion is dated March 25, 2026, and the accompanying Activity and Financial Insights Report was published publicly on April 2, 2026.
What actually happened here The mechanism behind this is a platform called Reeve, a financial data integrity system built to bridge conventional accounting workflows with public blockchain infrastructure. Reeve was first used by the Cardano Foundation for its 2024 report, but that version did not include a third-party auditor’s attestation. The 2025 cycle adds that layer: Grant Thornton’s sign-off now lives on Cardano’s ledger, meaning the connection between the audit opinion and the published financial data is verifiable without trusting any single party’s word for it.
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The Foundation’s CEO, Frederik Gregaard, described the initiative as a demonstration of “the highest standards of transparency,” combining statutory accounting requirements with on-chain verification.
As of December 31, 2025, the Foundation held total assets of CHF 287.5 million, or roughly $361 million. The allocation breaks down as 51.6% in ADA, 25.5% in Bitcoin, and 22.9% in cash equivalents and other financial assets. Total expenditures for the year came to CHF 23.6 million, spread across adoption programs, technology development, and governance work.
Why putting an audit on a blockchain is harder than it sounds Traditional audits produce a PDF and a letter. Those documents can be updated, taken down, or quietly replaced. On-chain attestation turns the audit record into something closer to a permanent entry in a public ledger: the cryptographic fingerprint of the financial data is recorded at a specific point in time, and any change to the underlying numbers would produce a different fingerprint, making tampering immediately detectable.
What this means for the broader landscape The Cardano Foundation is a non-profit steward of the Cardano ecosystem. Non-profit foundations are accountable to their communities rather than shareholders, and community members rarely have the tools to verify whether a foundation is managing resources responsibly. On-chain audit attestation gives them one.
Holding 51.6% of reserves in ADA and 25.5% in Bitcoin means the Foundation’s balance sheet is meaningfully exposed to crypto market volatility. CHF 287.5 million in total assets is a substantial treasury, and the decision to hold the majority in native crypto assets rather than retreating to cash reflects a deliberate strategic posture.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Kalshi rozšířila CFTC-regulované perpetual futures o BNB, ADA, WLD, AAVE a Venice Token (VVV). Produkty běží pod značkou American Perpetuals a vypořádávají se v USD.
Kalshi prediction market has expanded its perpetual futures (perps) offerings to include BNB, Cardano (ADA), and AAVE. The platform shows perpetual contracts for AI altcoins such as Worldcoin (WLD) and Venice Token (VVV) are also live for trading after approval from the US CFTC.
BNB, ADA, WLD, AAVE & Venice Token Perps Trading Goes Live on Kalshi Kalshi has added BNB, ADA, AAVE, WLD, and VVV to its line of US CFTC-regulated perpetual contracts. The products debuted under the trademark “American Perpetuals,” which aims to offer CFTC-regulated perpetual futures contracts for trading in the United States.
Notably, the prediction market platform filed for these perpetual futures with the CFTC last week. The max leverage varies by crypto asset, such as 4.5x for BNB and 1.9x for Venice Token.
Kalshi now offers perpetuals trading for Bitcoin and 17 altcoins such as ETH, XRP, SOL, HYPE, and Zcash. Notably, the perpetuals are CFTC-regulated, don’t have an expiration date, and settle in USD.
As CoinGape reported earlier, Kalshi last launched Zcash (ZEC), Near Protocol (NEAR), Dogecoin (DOGE), and Shiba Inu (SHIB) perps. However, approvals for XLM, DOT, and HBAR are still pending with the US CFTC.
The approvals came despite CME Group’s lawsuit against the US CFTC and Chairman Mike Selig, alleging these contracts are swaps. This week, the CFTC filed a motion to dismiss the CME lawsuit, arguing the exchange lacks standing on its competitive-injury claims.
BNB, ADA, WLD, AAVE and Venice Token Perps. Source: Kalshi
Prices Rebound amid More Perpetual Futures Approval by CFTC BNB price jumped more than 5% to $729 amid broader crypto market recovery. The price is currently trading around $723, with a massive 83% rise in trading volume in the last 24 hours.
ADA price has skyrocketed almost 10% to $0.222 as RealFi sets October 1 mainnet launch. Cardano price outlook shows further upside to $0.28.
Meanwhile, AAVE, WLD, and VVV prices also jumped higher as the US Treasury bought back $12.5 billion of debt in its latest Treasury buyback operation.
If you’re looking to explore prediction markets amid the dip in the crypto market, check out these best crypto prediction markets of 2026.
RealFi oznámil spuštění své DeFi platformy na mainnetu Cardana na 1. října 2026. Do Pioneer Season se zapojilo přes 3 600 uživatelů a provedli přes 40 000 akcí.
Following its public testnet phase, RealFi has set the launch date for its decentralized finance (DeFi) platform on the Cardano mainnet.
The RealFi team announced the date while providing an update on its Pioneer Season, which has served as a testing and feedback phase ahead of the mainnet rollout. According to the team, the platform will officially launch on Cardano on October 1, 2026.
Update on RealFi Pioneer Season Notably, the team noted that more than 3,600 users have participated in RealFi’s Pioneer Season, completing over 40,000 quest actions on the public testnet.
The team said the testnet provided valuable insights into how users interact with the platform while helping developers identify areas for improvement. Rather than serving as a simple demonstration, the Pioneer Season allowed RealFi to collect real user activity and community feedback and use those insights to refine the platform ahead of its mainnet debut.
RealFi also clarified that the Pioneer Season will continue until the mainnet launch. However, the extension does not reflect any major problem or setback.
Instead, the team plans to use the additional time to incorporate community feedback and strengthen the platform’s overall readiness. RealFi said it wants to make the transition to mainnet as smooth and polished as possible, with more details about the launch and changes for Pioneer participants expected closer to October.
RealFi Targets Real-World Finance on Cardano RealFi (Real Finance) aims to connect Cardano’s cryptocurrency liquidity with real-world financial activities and assets. Its broader vision includes microloans, real-world asset-backed financial products, and yield generated from productive economic activity rather than purely speculative trading.
The ecosystem’s key products include USDr, a Cardano-native dollar-pegged stablecoin backed by real-world assets, and sUSDr, a yield-bearing asset designed to generate returns from the underlying real-world asset portfolio.
Hoskinson Expects RealFi to Boost Cardano TVL Meanwhile, Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson also retweeted the latest announcement, signaling his support for the project. In a recent commentary, Hoskinson highlighted RealFi as one of the initiatives that could help drive Cardano’s next phase of growth. He believes the platform could attract billions of dollars into the Cardano ecosystem.
According to Hoskinson, users deposit assets into RealFi’s smart contracts, where the funds remain locked while generating yield. As participation grows, these deposits can increase Cardano’s total value locked (TVL), while deposits, withdrawals, and yield distributions also generate additional on-chain activity. In the meantime, Cardano’s TVL currently stands at $64.23 million, up 4.99% over the past 24 hours.
DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
Cardano is becoming more accessible to mainstream users as ChatterPay enables WhatsApp users to send and receive ADA directly through the messaging platform.
According to ChatterPay co-founder Tomás Di Mauro, WhatsApp users can now send ADA and Circle’s USDCx on Cardano to any WhatsApp contact globally. The integration brings Cardano-based payments into one of the world’s most widely used messaging platforms and could expose ADA to WhatsApp’s massive user base.
Notably, WhatsApp has more than 3 billion monthly active users, giving the integration a potentially significant reach and creating another avenue through which Cardano could reach mainstream audiences.
ChatterPay Brings Cardano Payments to WhatsApp The integration is powered by ChatterPay, a user-friendly, non-custodial WhatsApp wallet backed by Orion Fund. The wallet aims to simplify blockchain transactions for users without technical knowledge or extensive cryptocurrency experience.
Through ChatterPay, users can send ADA or USDCx directly to their WhatsApp contacts. The service aims to remove the complexity traditionally associated with creating and using blockchain wallets, making Cardano payments easier for everyday users.
How ChatterPay Works on WhatsApp ChatterPay also simplifies the process of creating a Cardano wallet. Users can begin directly through the ChatterPay Bot on WhatsApp by sending a message such as, “Hi! I want to create an account.”
Users can then enter a referral code if they have one or continue without one. The bot subsequently creates a Cardano wallet that users can use to receive funds.
Once the wallet is set up, users can manage several functions through the bot, including sending ADA, purchasing crypto, and checking their balance.
Sending ADA to WhatsApp Contacts The process is designed to be straightforward. Users can open WhatsApp, select a contact, enter the amount they want to send, and choose ADA or USDCx.
ChatterPay then requests confirmation before processing the transaction. In addition, users can send funds to Cardano users outside WhatsApp by entering their Cardano wallet address. They can also attach customized messages to their transfers.
This approach could make blockchain payments feel more similar to sending a regular message on WhatsApp, potentially lowering the barrier to entry for people unfamiliar with traditional crypto wallets.
Beyond Cardano, ChatterPay supports other major blockchain networks, including Bitcoin, Solana, and Ethereum. Consequently, the WhatsApp wallet is positioning itself as a broader gateway for digital-asset transactions rather than a Cardano-only payment solution.
DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
Zakladatel Cardana Charles Hoskinson řekl, že síť musí dokončit Leios, aktivovat hard fork a dotáhnout správu, aby odemkla další fázi růstu. ADA je letos v mínusu 40,71 %.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson said the network must complete critical roadmap and governance milestones to unlock its next phase of growth.
Hoskinson made the comments while discussing the latest voting update for Cardano’s Constitutional Committee (CC). During his remarks, he took a moment to highlight the progress across the ecosystem, arguing that Cardano’s development looks more promising when viewed from a broader perspective.
In particular, Hoskinson highlighted the launch of RealFi and the growing potential of Bitcoin DeFi to bring substantial liquidity into the ecosystem. He suggested that RealFi could attract billions of dollars in total value locked (TVL) over the coming years. Meanwhile, he noted that Bitcoin DeFi through Pogun has already secured $600 million in soft commitments.
Cardano Must “Finish What We Started” Despite this progress, Hoskinson stressed that Cardano must now “finish what we started.” He identified several priorities that would shape the network’s next phase of growth.
First, he emphasized the need to complete the Leios scalability upgrade. He also called for the relevant hard fork to be activated so that Cardano can advance with its planned technological improvements.
Governance, meanwhile, remains another critical priority. According to Hoskinson, the ecosystem must complete the last mile of governance while strengthening its existing institutions.
Furthermore, he wants Cardano’s institutions to develop the ability to improve continuously and operate with greater independence. In his view, the ecosystem must execute its roadmap more effectively while establishing a budget process that improves from one year to the next.
Ultimately, Hoskinson believes stronger institutions and more effective governance can help Cardano sustain development without repeatedly encountering the same obstacles.
Hoskinson Says Cardano Is “In It to Win” Despite the challenges ahead, Hoskinson maintained an optimistic outlook on Cardano’s future. He stressed that the ecosystem is “not out of the game” and remains determined to compete at the highest level.
He has maintained this stance despite the market turbulence ADA has experienced this year. The cryptocurrency is down 40.71% year-to-date and has consequently fallen out of the top 10 by market cap.
Nevertheless, several of the major initiatives highlighted by Hoskinson remain in active development. Leios and RealFi are scheduled to launch later this year, potentially giving Cardano new avenues for scalability and liquidity growth.
Meanwhile, the Cardano community has approved the Constitutional Committee proposal, ensuring that the committee maintains more than five members. This allows it to continue voting on crucial network upgrades, including the constitutional update associated with Leios.
DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
Cardano těsně odvrátilo krizi správy a řízení, když hlasování o obnově Constitutional Committee prošlo oběma požadovanými kvórami. DReps podpořili změnu 71,4 % a SPO 56,3 %.
A Close Call for Cardano GovernanceCardano (@cardano) has narrowly avoided a significant governance disruption after its Constitutional Committee renewal vote passed both required thresholds. DReps backed the update with 71.4% support, clearing the 67% threshold, while Stake Pool Operator (SPO) support reached 56.3%, surpassing the required 51%.
The stakes were high. Four of the committee's seven seats were set to expire at Epoch 653, and Intersect warned that a failed vote would reduce the committee to just three members, below the protocol's minimum size of five. That outcome would have effectively stalled most major on-chain governance actions, including treasury withdrawals, protocol parameter changes, hard fork initiations, and constitutional amendments, until the committee was rebuilt above the minimum threshold.
The renewal action, formally titled "Update Constitutional Committee 2026," was submitted on-chain on July 31 following an independently audited election. The four incoming members were elected through that community process and were ready to take their seats pending the on-chain vote.
Participation Concerns RemainWhile the outcome secured governance continuity, the margin on the SPO side exposed a structural weakness. Non-participating stake created most of the drag on approval, as uncast SPO votes count against ratification under Cardano's governance rules. The SPO threshold was cleared by a slim margin, pointing to a persistent participation gap that the community will need to address in future governance cycles.
The result keeps Cardano's three-pillar governance structure, comprising DReps, SPOs, and the Constitutional Committee, intact and functioning. The new members are set to serve terms running through Epoch 799, the maximum 146-epoch term permitted under the protocol.
Sources:
CryptoSlate: Cardano clears key voting thresholds for constitutional committee renewal
CryptoSlate: Cardano had two weeks to avoid a governance freeze
CryptoRank: Cardano governance freeze risk explained
Charles Hoskinson uvedl, že Cardano kdysi drželo 108 000 BTC z raného crowdsale. Tvrdí, že jeho vazby na Bitcoin komunitu mohou Cardanu pomoci v závodu o Bitcoin DeFi.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson suggested that his longstanding network within the Bitcoin community could give Cardano an advantage in the race to build Bitcoin DeFi.
Speaking recently on The Breakdown podcast, Hoskinson revealed that he was once among the world’s largest Bitcoin holders. He noted that Cardano’s early crowdsale controlled 108,000 Bitcoin. He explained that funds raised in Japanese yen during the crowdsale were converted into Bitcoin, resulting in the massive holding.
At Bitcoin’s price of roughly $250 at the time, the 108,000 BTC would have been worth about $27 million. Hoskinson also recalled discussing the holding with BitGo CEO Mike Belshe, describing the period as a “wild time.”
However, Hoskinson did not clarify whether he or any entity associated with the Cardano project still holds the Bitcoin. Notably, he suggested that his early involvement in Bitcoin helped him build longstanding relationships with major holders across the ecosystem. He believes those connections could become valuable as Cardano seeks to attract Bitcoin liquidity into DeFi.
Cardano Targets Bitcoin’s Idle Liquidity According to Hoskinson, Bitcoin holders could allocate capital to DeFi if Cardano delivers products that offer compelling, reliable yield opportunities.
At the same time, he stressed that Bitcoiners want DeFi solutions that respect Bitcoin’s core principles. These include self-custody, control over assets and properly structured lending, without requiring changes to Bitcoin or forcing users into specific Layer-2 solutions.
That vision aligns with Pogun, an initiative by Input Output Group designed to connect Bitcoin’s idle liquidity to Cardano’s DeFi ecosystem while allowing users to retain custody of their private keys.
Pogun Advances Toward Bitcoin DeFi Pogun’s 2026 roadmap includes a non-margin, oracle-free credit market in Q2, followed by a fixed-term yield DApp in Q3. The initiative is also targeting a BitVM-based, trust-minimized Bitcoin bridge in Q4.
Hoskinson has additionally highlighted major improvements in the technology supporting Cardano’s Bitcoin DeFi strategy. He said the size of a Bitcoin DeFi proof has fallen from 40 GB to 28.1 MB, while validation time has dropped from roughly 354 seconds to 0.149 seconds.
The cost of validating a transaction has also reportedly declined sharply, from around $14,000 to $37.
$1.5B Potential Demand Meanwhile, Pogun CEO Omer Husain recently said the project is already building its loan book ahead of launch. According to Husain, its founding borrowers have indicated $500 million in demand, while regulated institutions on the lending side have expressed interest in providing up to $1 billion.
The reported demand and technological improvements could strengthen Cardano’s efforts to tap Bitcoin’s vast liquidity pool. However, the success of that strategy will ultimately depend on whether Pogun and other Cardano-based Bitcoin DeFi products can deliver the security, custody, and lending standards Bitcoin holders expect.
DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.
Cardano je nově veřejnou ověřovací vrstvou pro firemní dodavatelské řetězce po nasazení Blockforce v Brazílii. Už bylo zaznamenáno přes 500 000 záznamů a náklady na jeden záznam klesly o 92 %.
Cardano is now being used as a public verification layer for enterprise supply chains, after the Cardano Foundation and Blockforce deployed their traceability architecture in production in Brazil. More than 500,000 supply chain records have already been anchored, including data from some of Brazil’s largest fashion groups, according to a Monday statement.
The system uses a permissioned network to store the underlying supply chain information, keeping commercially sensitive records accessible only to participating parties. Cardano receives only the cryptographic proof of each record, enabling independent verification by auditors, regulators or customers without exposing confidential data.
Cost had been a major obstacle to deploying this type of architecture at scale. As reported, engineering work by the Cardano Foundation and Blockforce cut the cost per anchored record by 92%, allowing public verification to move beyond pilot projects and into live enterprise operations.
Among the early users is Azzas 2154, Latin America’s largest fashion group, which uses the platform to build auditable histories for its leather supply chain. The company cross-checks fiscal documents, supplier information and public databases and plans to trace all leather used across its brands by 2030.
The companies have signed contracts covering 6.5 million certified records through 2030. They also plan to extend the model into sectors including automotive, agribusiness, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, positioning Cardano as a public proof layer for supply chains where compliance and provenance need to be independently verified.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
Cardano čelí riziku zpoždění upgradu, protože hlasování o Update CC 2026 ještě nedosáhlo potřebného kvóra. DReps jsou na 66,3 % z 67 %, SPOs na 39 % z 51 %.
Cover image via U.Today Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. The financial and market information provided on U.Today is intended for informational purposes only. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. Conduct your own research by contacting financial experts before making any investment decisions. We believe that all content is accurate as of the date of publication, but certain offers mentioned may no longer be available.
The Update Constitutional Committee 2026 governance action is nearing its voting deadline, and participation has not yet reached the threshold needed.
Intersect notes that the governance action expires at 21:44:51 UTC on September 1 and encourages DReps and stake pool operators (SPOs) to vote before the deadline.
A setback in the governance action could affect progress towards the Dijkstra hard fork and Leios upgrade, which will require constitutional as well as technical updates.
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Less than 48 hours leftAccording to Intersect, the Update CC 2026 action will expire on September 1 at 21:44:51 UTC, with less than 48 hours to vote.
Intersect shared the current voting progress; DReps are now very close to the required threshold of 67%, currently at 66.3%. For SPOs, a significant shift in voting participation is still needed within the next 48 hours, with 39% achieved out of the 51% threshold.
48 HOURS TO VOTE: The Update CC 2026 action will expire on Sep 1 at 21:44:51 UTC. ⚠️
Update: DReps are now very close to the required threshold. For SPOs, a significant shift in voting participation is still… pic.twitter.com/M97wLbItLI
— Intersect (@IntersectMBO) August 30, 2026 Intersect highlighted the urgency of SPO participation, as if this action does not pass, existing committee members' terms will expire, and the committee will fall below the required "committeeMinSize" of five.
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Until the committee returns to at least five members, Treasury Withdrawal, Parameter Update, Constitution Update, and Hard Fork Initiation actions cannot be ratified. This could also hinder progress towards Dijkstra and Leios, which necessitate constitutional and technical updates.
The Dijkstra era delivers Cardano's next major protocol upgrade in two phases. Phase 1 introduces the Dijkstra ledger era and ships Ouroboros Linear Leios as a complete, activated feature, targeting Q4 2026. Phase 2 activates Ouroboros Peras via an intra-era hard fork.
Cardano goes live as public proof layerCardano is now live as the public proof layer in Blockforce's traceability platform. The system runs with Brazil's largest fashion groups and has anchored more than 500,000 supply chain records.
The architecture separates confidentiality from verifiability. Records for each supply chain step sit on a permissioned network, visible only to the parties involved. Only the cryptographic proof of those records is anchored to Cardano, where any auditor, regulator, or customer can confirm a record is genuine without seeing the underlying data.
