Cardano ADA
Rank #17 by market cap
Last 7 days
CM Profile: Cardano
Cryptominium Profile. What we have established, measured and written about ADA, and what we have not.
- Measured
- Selling $100,000 on 2 exchange order books lost between 0.09% and 0.10%, on 9 October 2026.
- Its price, recorded by us every day since 9 August 2026.
- Written, with sources
Read from our own records when this page was made. It describes what we know, and is not a view on whether to hold ADA. How each part is worked out
What changed
Week to 9 OctoberNothing we measure moved much this week: exchange depth on Kraken, trading volume, reported supply and price are all within their usual range.
From our own measurements only, each against the month before. We do not say why a price moves. How this is worked out · Every coin this week
What it actually costs to sell ADA
Selling $100,000 of ADA into each exchange’s resting bids, measured against the mid price:
| Exchange | Lost | Got back | Measured |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kraken ADA/USD | 0.09% | $99,914 | 2026-10-09 median of 6 |
| Coinbase ADA/USD | 0.10% | $99,901 | 2026-10-08 |
Exchange figures need an account there (and KYC, a permitted country, the tokens already deposited), are before trading fees, and are never averaged with the on-chain figure. Binance is not included: it refuses requests from the region our servers are in. How this is measured →
Watch this number instead of remembering it. A free account keeps ADA on a list, records where it stood the day you added it, and emails you if selling it on these exchanges gets materially harder — one message, not a series. The measurement itself stays public; the account is for being told when it moves without you looking.
What Cardano is
Cardano is a proof-of-stake blockchain founded in 2017 by Charles Hoskinson, one of Ethereum's original co-founders. Its distinguishing feature is method: changes are formally specified and peer-reviewed academically before they are built, an approach borrowed from safety-critical engineering.
Its Ouroboros consensus was the first proof-of-stake protocol with published security proofs. Cardano uses an extended UTXO model closer to Bitcoin's accounting than Ethereum's, which makes transaction outcomes more predictable but smart contracts harder to write.
The trade-off is delivery speed. Smart contracts did not arrive until 2021, years after launch and long after competitors shipped equivalents, and the gap between announced research and usable product has been a persistent criticism. Its DeFi and application ecosystem remains smaller than the market capitalisation implies. Whether the deliberate pace is prudent engineering or lost ground is the genuine debate about Cardano, and both readings have evidence behind them.
What Cardano can do
Selling $100,000 on Kraken lost 0.09% against the mid price, before trading fees. Check your own amount →
Our own measurement · measured 9 October 2026
Ada sits in a wallet whose keys you hold, and staking it never moves it out of that wallet. What a wallet actually is →
Source: Cardano: what Cardano is · checked 2 October 2026
Anyone can send ada to anyone else, anywhere, without a third party in between. Why a payment cannot be undone →
Source: Cardano: what ada is · checked 2 October 2026
Ada can be staked by delegating it to a stake pool. It stays in your own wallet and can be spent at any time, with no lock-up. The pool keeps a fixed fee and a share of the rewards.
Source: Cardano: stake pool delegation · checked 2 October 2026
Cardano runs programs stored on its chain, written in its own contract language, Plutus. Each app is its own code with its own flaws.
Source: Cardano docs: Plutus · checked 2 October 2026
The supply is capped at 45 billion ada. New ada enters circulation only from a fixed reserve, as staking rewards and funding for the network's treasury.
Source: Cardano: what Cardano is · checked 2 October 2026
What a coin can do is not a reason to buy it or to sell it. Each answer names its source and the day we read it; where we could not source one, the row is left out. How these are written · Every coin we have written up
About the asset
Cardano has no token contract — it is the native asset of its own chain, not a token issued on someone else's.
Price change
Compare Cardano with
Cardano data synced 2m ago from CoinGecko. Figures shown in USD. This page is market information, not financial advice — and nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell ADA.