The Cardano network is gaining popularity just months before its Vasil hard fork in June. The total value locked (including staking) in the Cardano protocol is currently hovering around $400 Million – its highest ever value.
The increase in numbers was most noticeable during March, in which the TVL climbed by over 100% from $199 Million to $403.7 Million. Nearly half of the volumes are attributed to the rapidly increasing decentralized exchange, Miniswap. Since its launch, Miniswap has vied to overtake SundaeSwap as the best liquidity provider on the Cardano platform.
Bullish or Bullish?
An increase in the total value locked can indicate several positives but typically, it suggests that a network is gaining liquidity, popularity, and/or usability. It also implies confidence in the network’s decentralized applications, due to which more users engage with staking and lending mechanisms.
For the moment, a mere 69 decentralized applications run on the Cardano network, which is miles away from founder Charles Hoskinson’s vision of running thousands of dApps on the platform by 2021. However, the recently announced Vasil hard fork is expected to broaden Cardano’s landscape. According to Hoskinson, the hard fork “is going to bring in a lot of Plutus improvements”, making the platform more developer-friendly for the creation of decentralized applications.
Cardano Logs Increase In Total Transactions
Meanwhile, the total transactions were making a comeback over the past two weeks as more users were engaging with their ADA tokens. Historically, higher transaction counts have been known to correlate to a more volatile market. This was most noticeable during November-December, during which a decline in total transactions coincided with a drastic price downturn, and between 10-17 January, in which ADA’s value spiked soon after its transactions began to recover.
ADA Daily Chart – $1 a stone’s throw away
The increased volatility amid a rising TVL score could be determinantal to ADA’s success on the chart. A major resistance mark hovers at $1 and with Bitcoin still trading below its ATH, short-trading is a potential threat for any altcoin that is trading below important price levels.
However, ADA can turn the tide by registering a daily close above $1. For the moment, momentum aided the ‘buy-side as ADA was trading a near 30% premium when compared to its 13 March low.