Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has shared his thoughts on where the next catalyst for the growth of the ADA ecosystem would come from.
Notably, the crypto industry leader highlighted this in a recent interview with the Altcoin Daily co-owner Aaron Arnold. He pegged the next wave of Cardano adoption on the expansion of its decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem.
Arnold asked Hoskinson if he is more bullish on Cardano or its sidechain, Midnight. In response, he reiterated his commitment to both projects but highlighted that a closer collaboration between them would spur widespread adoption for the entire ADA ecosystem.
He further noted that Cardano has peaked as a layer 1 network. Hence, the founder claimed that for Cardano to get to the next level, it needs to embrace the DeFi ecosystem.
“We’ve got to start putting up the numbers,” Hoskinson noted, emphasizing the need to grow in key DeFi metrics.
Hoskinson stressed that the Cardano ecosystem’s monthly active users (MAU), total value locked (TVL), and stablecoin issuance must increase by 10 to 100 times from their current levels. According to him, this is necessary to unlock the next wave of growth for Cardano.
Meanwhile, the network has made several efforts to boost its DeFi ecosystem, which currently lags behind other major chains like Ethereum and Solana. Recently, the Cardano Foundation committed eight-figure ADA to enhance stablecoin DeFi liquidity. Hoskinson also revealed that the ecosystem is working to bring USDC and USDT to Cardano this year, aiming to improve user traction.
Further, Hoskinson called Midnight the first of the fourth generation of cryptocurrencies, stating that it brings something different to the entire digital asset industry. He noted that if Midnight moves faster in its emerging privacy niche, it could capture a large share of the crypto market.
Again, he stressed that if decentralized applications (DApps) on Cardano work closely with Midnight by upgrading to a hybrid platform and adding privacy to their systems, they could gain the next million users. He highlighted that this would happen as they would gain a large number of users from Bitcoin, XRP, and other chains. Consequently, this would affect Cardano’s DeFi metrics and trigger the next bull season for the network.
Notably, Hoskinson had previously highlighted the role Midnight would play in boosting Cardano DeFi, citing its multi-chain compatibility and privacy advantages. In the interview, he added that Midnight would attract even the legacy financial system, seeking RWA tokenization and global remittance.
Ultimately, the aim of the close collaboration between Cardano and Midnight is to create a new experience for retail and institutional users better than those seen in Ethereum and Solana. Hoskinson stated that it would be a “bull year” for Cardano if this happens.
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