Cardano’s core institutions have submitted a joint proposal seeking 70 million ADA from the Treasury to fund a series of “critical integrations” scheduled for the network’s 2026 roadmap. The coalition argues that Cardano still lacks several essential components needed to support expanding sectors like decentralized finance, real-world asset tokenization, and institutional adoption.
Five Core Areas Targeted for Cardano’s Upgrade Plan
The integration roadmap is built around five major priorities: onboarding top-tier stablecoins, securing institutional-grade custody solutions, improving on-chain analytics, enabling cross-chain bridges, and deploying globally recognized pricing oracles.
The requested funds can only be unlocked with approval from both the Delegated Representatives and the Constitutional Committee. The proposing institutions say they are already in deep discussions with leading integration partners. Intersect is serving as the program administrator and has full support from its board.
This proposal follows a temporary chain split that occurred recently on Cardano. Intersect explained that a faulty delegation transaction triggered a cryptography library bug discovered on the Preview testnet in early 2022. The issue caused the network to briefly fork into two chains until coordinated action resolved the problem.
Hoskinson Urges Cooperation as Cardano Approaches a Pivotal Phase
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson addressed the issue during his “Thanksgiving for Unity” livestream on November 27. He emphasized the need for Cardano’s institutions to rebuild trust and work together as the network enters a critical stage in 2026. He acknowledged that internal disputes, including a social fork, soft fork, and long-chain reorg, have strained relationships over the past year.
Hoskinson admitted that his direct communication style contributed to some of the tensions and apologized for intensifying disagreements. He urged the ecosystem to stay united, warning that future progress depends on cooperation across Cardano’s institutions.
He highlighted renewed collaboration among IOG, the Cardano Foundation, EMURGO, Intersect, and the Midnight Foundation. Hoskinson said the community should expect more aligned governance proposals going forward — including the “critical integrations” budget now under review.
Addressing concerns about the recent soft fork, Hoskinson dismissed claims of systemic failure. He said the event instead demonstrated the strength of Cardano’s Nakamoto-style proof-of-stake protocol, which allowed the chain to re-stabilize without major disruption or data loss.
Hoskinson added that achieving the 2026 vision will require industry-wide cooperation. He pointed to contributions from new groups like the Midnight Foundation, collaboration-focused platforms like Intersect, technical contributors such as Pragma, and established institutions like IOG and the Cardano Foundation. He stressed that community participation remains essential to every part of the plan.
