The CCI V1 closure report accounts for the ₳70M treasury budget managed by Intersect to onboard tier-one Cardano infrastructure. It successfully deployed native Circle USDC, LayerZero, Pyth Network, and Dune Analytics. Institutional custody via Fireblocks missed the V1 window due to unmet commercial terms and will instead be requested alongside Year 2 maintenance in the upcoming CCI V2 proposal.

IOG has introduced Blaster, an automated formal verification engine for Lean 4 designed to provide mathematical security guarantees for Cardano smart contracts. Tested on complex protocols like Djed and USDCx, Blaster automatically checks for common vulnerabilities (such as double satisfaction) using a Common Vulnerability Library. Developed alongside six ecosystem partners, this tool aims to lower the barrier to high-assurance development, fostering institutional trust and TVL growth for Cardano's Vision 2030.

IO's core teams released Cardano Node v11.0.1 to support the upcoming protocol version 11 intra-era hard fork, while the ledger team advanced preparations for the Dijkstra era. The Plutus team enhanced the UPLC command-line tool, introducing script optimizations that yield over 10% in execution cost savings. In scaling, Hydra v2.1.0 was launched with 7% lower snapshot latency and protocol v12+ compatibility, and Mithril finalized key SNARK circuit validations and standard Schnorr signatures.

IOG has submitted a treasury proposal for ₳27.7M to mature Ouroboros Leios from a testnet prototype into a mainnet-ready release candidate by late 2026. By introducing endorser blocks and committee-based validation, Leios will safely scale Cardano’s throughput capacity by 10x to 65x through a phased rollout. This development directly supports the ecosystem's Vision 2030 goals, featuring milestone-gated funding and independent oversight.

The consensus team advanced the Leios prototype by migrating flags to the Praos header, launching a dedicated testnet, and pre-releasing Cardano Node v11.0. In scaling, Hydra optimized benchmark performance for high transaction volumes, while Mithril completed data encoding and state transition tests for its recursive SNARK prototype. Additionally, the research team officially submitted their proposal on-chain.

The Cardano Foundation and the University of Brasília (UnB) have partnered to launch Latin America’s first Cardano Project Development Lab. Focused on blockchain, AI, and IoT, the hub will drive public sector innovation. The collaboration includes academic curricula and policymaker training to enhance transparency and digital trust across Brazil's government.

This report marks the launch of IO’s 2026 treasury proposals on the official proposals website, accompanied by the Q4 2025 – Q1 2026 delivery report detailing recent technical milestones. The consensus team continues to advance the Ouroboros Leios prototype, while the Mithril team focuses on implementing succinct proofs (SNARKs) to enhance network scaling. In governance, the Intersect committee elections conclude their voting phase today, May 1, marking a key step in decentralized decision-making for the ecosystem.

Nine 2026 treasury proposals from IO are now live, focusing on scalability and performance with DRep voting open until May 24. The consensus team advanced the Leios prototype by adding throughput metrics and investigating storage latency to ensure protocol stability. A significant update from the Plutus team introduced script optimizations for the UPLC executable, which can reduce execution costs by an average of 10%. Additionally, the Mithril team prepared for SNARK circuit production readiness, while Intersect committee elections are underway with 105 candidates competing for 37 seats.

Intersect is shifting to a flexible 2026 strategy focused on five pillars, including infrastructure stewardship. Key to this is a new 3% administration fee, replacing flat budgets to provide on-demand support for treasury projects. They also launched the Administration Hub for transparency and are preparing for a multi-client future to boost network resilience.

Yoroi Wallet is rebranding to SecondFi, a neofinance platform bridging everyday spending with on-chain services like trading, earning, and global card payments. The transition is seamless: existing assets and staking remain safe, and the app updates automatically. While the platform evolves, the Yoroi brand will persist independently as a dedicated DRep to support Cardano governance.