Cardano News

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.

Pyth Pro is live on Cardano, delivering low-latency institutional price feeds to DeFi via Indigo Protocol. Separately, EMURGO announced Yoroi Wallet's rebrand to SecondFi, evolving it into a broader neofinance platform. Intersect confirmed its committee election results and verified Node v11.0.1 is mainnet-ready for the Van Rossem hard fork. Additionally, the Cardano Foundation partnered with the University of Brasília for a new tech lab and integrated with Scorechain for compliance.

The April 2026 Intersect Committee Elections have concluded. A total of 102 candidates ran for 37 seats across eight committees, yielding a 24.8% voter turnout (187 members casting 3,967 ballots). Following an internal review and an independent audit by Dquadrant, the results were officially certified. Intersect also announced upcoming measures to strengthen member verification. The next elections are slated for 2027.

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 Roundtable examines DRep participation and accountability in Cardano governance. Discussants focused on overcoming inconsistency and "DRep fatigue" through better voting rationales and sustainable role definitions. The goal is a robust framework that keeps DReps active and accountable, ensuring long-term decentralized alignment.

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.