What is Cardano? Will Cardano go to $100?

With constant innovation and invention of new cryptocurrencies, traders are finding themselves diving into more opportunities than what they had before. One of such new opportunities has arrived in the form of a new open-source project and cryptocurrency network, called Cardano, that focuses on a public blockchain platform to facilitate smart contracts. Its internal cryptocurrency is named ADA, which is developed, overseen and managed by a Switzerland-based foundation, named as Cardano Foundation. 

Let’s now dig deeper into the topic and know what is cardano and how does its transaction blocks work differently as compared to other cryptocurrencies in the world.

What is Cardano?

Being the first peer-reviewed blockchain project in the world, Cardano has been introduced in the market after an extensive examination which was done by assembling a network of scientists and academics from different universities. They were responsible to review its protocol so as to make sure that there would be no problem in its launch.

Cardano prides itself for being a 3rd-generation of cryptocurrency as well as a smart contract platform that claims to be effective in scaling problems of first-generation and second-generation coins, including Bitcoin and Ethereum respectively.

Background – proof of stake technology

Referred to a proof-of-stake blockchain technology, Cardano works on the PoS system that enables minors to validate or mine transaction blocks according to their investments. Since its introduction in 2017, Cardano has been working under the token symbol of ADA, which was named after Ada Lovelace, the 19th-century mathematician. Whereas, Cardano has been named after Gerolamo Cardano, who was an Italian polymath.

Charles Hoskinson, a mathematician and an entrepreneur, is the man behind Cardano Foundation– works under the umbrella of IOHK (Input Output Hong Kong)- who was one of the co-founders of a second-generation cryptocurrency, Ethereum (ETH).

Although Ethereum has been performing well in terms of smart contracts, Hoskinson decided to bring some evolution with a third generation of cryptocurrencies that are sure to take crypto trading to the next level. With this thought, three organizations got together and began working full-time to develop and manage Cardano. These organizations are:

1. IOHK
2. The Cardano Foundation
3. Emurgo

Since Hoskinson already knew the second generation of blockchains in detail, he knew that there is still room for improvement and evolution. He picked positive elements from both generations and added a few more creative and innovative elements to develop a third generation of cryptocurrency i.e. Cardano. This blockchain technology aims to work on the following three important elements of crypto trading:

• Scalability
• Sustainability
• Interoperability

The thing that makes Cardano transaction blocks different from other blockchain technologies is its development on peer-reviewed research and scientific philosophy. The aim of the entire engineering is to achieve ‘High Assurance Code’ in order to ensure that it has got better coding than before.

Cardano Blockchain

Cardano blockchain has been through a number of eras; each of them has been named in respect of a literary figure such as Goguen, Voltaire, Byron, Basho and Shelley. Every era has shown some unique features that helped Cardano to get into the form as it is today. Its Goguen era is behind the integration of smart contracts that gave a major boost to its network as it facilitates trusted agreements and transactions to be carried out among anonymous and unrelated parties without the involvement of an authority. Some of the cryptocurrencies that support such transactions are Polkadot (DOT), Cosmos (ATOM), Ethereum and Tron (TRX).

How Does It Work?

Developers have included two layers in The Cardano platform, which are:

• The Cardano Settlement Layer or CSL- It allows traders to transfer and record ADA between accounts.
• The Cardano Computation Layer or CCL- It works on the smart contract logic to let developers move funds through programming.

When it comes to understanding what is Cardano and how does it work, it’s important to understand that it works on a platform called Ouroboros. Basically, it is an algorithm that works on the protocols and programming of proof-of-stake for mining. One of the best things that distinguish these protocols from other blockchain technologies in the facility to customize time and energy usage of mining new coins.

Ouroboros

When traders decide to get into more details and start by understanding Ouroboros, they would figure out that Ouroboros is responsible to divide time into epochs that are referred to as slots, which are of the fixed time periods. These slots are same as shifts in a factory. They have to encompass the time range in one way the other and if necessary, have to modify them with the help of the algorithm. Every epoch has its own slot leader, elected by nodes or stakeholders, that are responsible to develop and confirm transaction blocks in the Cardano blockchain. In case of a failure, the next leader will be given the chance with the next epoch. When the transactions are carried out by slot leaders, input endorsers have to approve them. They are the second group of stakeholders who are responsible to ensure smooth running of the protocol.

In order to keep the results unbiased in cryptocurrency blockchains, there are two inputs required by the election system. First is the multiparty computation system, which is a group of nodes in the network that works like a coin toss and therefore, have to share the results with one another. The second type of input is referred to as the distribution of stake or wealth, where the nodes with more coins or greater stake are more likely to get elected as slot leaders.

What is Cardano used for?

Considering the fact that cryptocurrencies are taking up the world by storm, it’s necessary to currently work on the interoperability of blockchain with the crypto world. Apart from allowing people to develop smart contracts, developers have made Cardano to facilitate them to take advantage from dApps or decentralized applications that anyone can use for their specific purposes. Cardano has turned out to be one of the influential and focused cryptocurrencies in this regard as it used to work on three major obstacles that traders might face in the crypto world.

Obstacle 01: Metadata

It refers to the all the information behind transaction blocks. If a trader wants to invest/trade with $50, then the metadata would be as follows:

• Where has the money been spent?
• Who did the trader give money to?

Although this doesn’t sound as much effective to the cryptocurrency world as it is expected, the legacy banking sector is where it gives the maximum results. It causes the entities to face problems post ICOs because they don’t have the required metadata to provide to the banks.

The reasons behind the need of metadata in this blockchain are:

• Identification or discovery of resources
• Effective, provably secure and reliable electronic data organization
• Ways or methods with which the data has been exchanged among the systems to improve interoperability
• Efficiency in resource protection followed by identification of behavior and characteristics required to replicate it

Here, the worth mentioning fact is that metadata brings some cons with it as well. Since metadata stores personal and important information in the blockchain, either permanent or on transparent basis, the users might get into a situation where they have to permanently affix them to the blockchain. This is where Developers have to work on the Cardano’s proof-of-stake blockchain technology– although they have been conducting scientific research since a long time.

Obstacle 02: Attribution

Just like metadata, attribution requires programming that can store the names and details of the people/traders involved in the transaction blocks. In case of permanently fixing attribution, there might be a compromise on the participant’s privacy, which eventually cause them to think of a substitute later on.

To avoid this risk, Cardano blockchain has planned to empower the users to exercise attribution whenever they feel like.

Obstacle 03: Compliance

Revolving around a number of factors like ATF (Anti-Terrorist Financing), KYC (Know Your Customer), AML (Anti-Money Laundering) etc., it’s important to always be rest assured about the compliance and legitimacy of transactions. For a trader, it’s necessary to make sure that the transaction is not being carried out for nefarious benefits. It should be legal and authentic.

Currently, the developers of Cardano blockchain still have to learn how it could use compliance in conjunction with attribution and metadata so that their users can interact whenever they want.

Where Else Is It Used?

Apart from the above three obstacles, Cardano, with its two layers of protocol, has proved itself useful for a number of purposes. As a matter of fact, archaic management processes and centralized structures encounter issues every now and then- particularly high manual workflow, poor governance, data breaches, higher expenses, procedural inefficiency, frauds and limited transparency. As the third generation blockchain technology, Cardano intends to solve all these problems. 

Since Cardano is referred to as the open-source platform to carry out smart contracts, users are rest assured of finding such ways that can solve a number of problems followed by bringing significant development in multiple industries. Some of the critical areas, where it holds a lot of significance, are:

• Counterfeit: IOHK facilitates users with Atala SCAN, which is basically a tamper-proof program that ensures product provenance. It is an auditable project that intends to prevent customers and brands from frauds or counterfeit in the retail sector.
• Education: This sector takes advantage from Atala PRISM, which is referred to as a credentials and ID solution. This blockchain is responsible to protect academic certifications with the help of a tamper-proof ecosystem.
• Government: Here, the decentralized system is used to issue credentials and manage verification systems to decrease dependency on issuing authorities.
• Digital Identity: Cardano is responsible to give an identity to those citizens who are not using bank services from developing countries.
• Agriculture: Its blockchain technology helps the users in product certifications and tracing through EMURGO or Atala Trace solutions.
• Healthcare: In the healthcare sector, Cardano’s Atala SCAN is useful as it authenticates and verifies the chain of pharmaceutical products & services along with guaranteeing safety of the patients.
• Other Important Uses

As a decentralized open-source platform, Cardano aims to outperform its competitors by providing incredible design and functionality options. Its protocol design promises to provide better scalability, compatibility and security of the proof-of-stake blockchain technology so that it will be easy for the financial sector to make decisions.

Since Cardano blockchain is still in its development stage, its usage is quite limited. Products that have been developed on its protocol (consisting of the Settlement Layer and Computation Layer) are usually focused on digital identity and supply chain traceability. IOHK prides itself for offering multiple Cardano products that business or enterprises can employ to improve their supply chain’s performance and traceability.

In other words, ADA coin of Cardano can be used as that of Bitcoins or Ethereum. However, the thing to remember is that Bitcoin can carry out 7 transactions in a second while Cardano is capable of facilitating users with tens of thousands transactions in a second, which makes the network more efficient and provably secure as a payment system.

In short, it can be said that Cardano ADA cryptocurrency works as a payment method or a voting tool for ADA holders who appreciate long-term productive approach, development and financial changes in the ecosystem. It verifies transactions and maintains their security on the blockchain, which is being operated by stake pool operators.

Will Cardano go to $100?

As we all know that Cardano is the first peer-reviewed blockchain solution in the world, its native ADA cryptocurrency is responsible to power the protocol its follows. Developed by Charles Hoskinson, Cardano got an incredible start to its popularity in 2017.

Initially, the Cardano’s financial team made a lot of efforts and raised over $63 million with the aim of bringing a significant growth to their business, when Bitcoin already has more than 50% of the market coverage. Their efforts paid off and ADA got listed in a number of cryptocurrency exchanges. Since its start till 2020, Cardano experienced incredible fame and response from the traders.

Even, during its development phase in 2020, ADA was being traded at $0.03, which increased to $0.06 within a short time period. Later on, due to the outbreak of COVID-19, the price went down to a shocking price of $0.02 but it managed to maintain its steady growth by the end of July when its price moved to $0.15.

The year ended with ADA being traded at $0.17, which is a pretty good price as compared to what it started the 2020 year.

Price Prediction

• For 2021

Since its introduction, Cardano blockchain has managed to get a spot among some of the top blockchains in the world. It is now named as the Japan’s Ethereum, which was founded by Hoskinson. The reason behind this title is the fact that 95% of the Cardano’s volume is held by Japanese people. There have been a lot of predictions that Cardano ADA will surge up from day 1 of 2021 and may get to a new high point by the end of 2021- which could be $10.

• For 2022

According to the financial approach and speculations, ADA is expected to be starting 2022 with $12 price, which is pretty good as compared to where it is today. However, the price may reach a new high if Cardano focuses on some developments and finds more investors to increase their volume. Experts have predicted that Cardano may reach a new high of $22 by the end of 2022.

• 5 Years

For the span of 5 years or more, cryptocurrency ADA may achieve a number of victories and give rewards to the traders in return since there would be more and more integrations and partnerships happening in their network. The price of ADA is expected to get affected by these variations and may reach a new high of $100, if everything goes as it has been predicted.

Is Cardano a good investment?

Needless to say, the prices of cryptocurrencies (especially Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple etc.) depend upon a number of factors. In order to figure out whether ADA or Cardano is worth the investment and it can give greater rewards than its peer, it’s necessary to analyze the prevailing factors or elements that drive their value.

Considering the fact that the volume of cryptocurrency ADA is limited, the mechanism and rewards of coins are resistant to inflation because of their constant growth and development. The decentralized nature is what makes them safe and secured for investment whereas, their layered architecture and constant development is responsible to ensure scalability. In short, it can be said that the technical characteristics of ADA coins has managed to make them unique and preferable in the crypto market.

Also, the rewards or returns of this decentralized cryptocurrency, Cardano, depends upon the number of smart contracts and dApps that are developed on the proof-of-stake blockchains. A rigorous and focused academic and scientific research can make this blockchain durable and stable, which eventually makes this coin worth the investment.

Wrapping Up

Currently, Cardano has become one of the important cryptocurrencies and with the help of its incredible mechanism, it has managed to get a spot among top cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple etc. It doesn’t only facilitate individuals but turn out to be beneficial for enterprises as well. ADA is the part of its Settlement Layer, which makes it a worthy investment for people who are just starting their trading and need to play a safe game in the beginning.

Rest assured, Hoskinson and the Cardano Foundation has got multiple plans to make its future better and bright. It aims to move from the settlement layers to the Control layer that is considered as a secured or trusted framework for multiple systems, including gaming systems or gambling. Users can also take advantage of its identity management, universal cryptocurrency wallet, Daedalus, long-term financial approach and credit system along with cryptocurrency to fiat conversion. However, it’s still a mystery whether ADA would work for the planned systems and projects or not.

In the upcoming years, traders may find Cardano with a better mechanism and financial strength as the foundation has made a list of partner institutions that would help to refine its algorithm and design a new and better governance structure. 

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