Hoskinson calls Cardano a better store of value than Bitcoin

What happened

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson used a weekend YouTube livestream to argue that ADA is a stronger store of value than Bitcoin, pushing back against holders frustrated by the token's long decline. Decrypt reported that the session turned combative, while The Crypto Basic, which described it as a Nov. 7 AMA, said Hoskinson also called Cardano's technology superior. He rejected a viewer's assertion that he had promised Cardano would overtake Bitcoin, saying he would like that outcome but never guaranteed it and does not promise price appreciation.

The exchange sharpened when a viewer produced an older remark in which Hoskinson said he thought Cardano would probably become the largest cryptocurrency. Hoskinson focused on the word think and said he had taken the project as far as he could, with the network now decentralized and no longer dependent on its founder. When the viewer called it unreasonable for a founder to owe nothing to investors, Hoskinson said his obligations ended with the roadmap. Decrypt reported that he described the five-era plan as finished, said everything he promised to build had been delivered, and called the network self-determining and self-governing, able to choose its own leaders without his consent.

Hoskinson then framed the complaint as financial rather than technical. He said holders effectively want him to support prices, and he argued that no founder could satisfy every buyer's target because new investors keep arriving at higher levels. Decrypt reported that he described the demand as an endless task.

Why it matters

The comments matter because they mark a public attempt to separate Cardano's technical progress from ADA's market performance. Decrypt said ADA is down 94% from its 2021 high, a drawdown that has left some investors pressing Hoskinson for accountability. His response reframes the founder's job as delivering a decentralized network rather than managing the token price. The Crypto Basic noted that his store-of-value claim is his assessment, not an established market fact, and that Bitcoin remains far larger by market value.

The livestream also sketched Hoskinson's preferred next phase. He said Cardano is built for applications and that the base technology is basically done, so his most useful work now is to help create projects that attract users. He named RealFi, Pogun and Midnight, acknowledged that some efforts will fail, and argued that successful ones would bring activity to Cardano. He also said every NIGHT holder is already a Cardano user because NIGHT was distributed as a Cardano-native asset and requires Cardano infrastructure. A major project reaching billions of dollars in value, he said, would show what the platform can support and draw more infrastructure demand and transactions.

What the data shows

Market data shows the gap Hoskinson is addressing. The Crypto Basic put ADA at about $0.175 and Cardano's market capitalization at roughly $6.45 billion, while Bitcoin remains much larger. Decrypt's data showed ADA down 94% from its 2021 high. The token reached an all-time high of $3.09 in 2021, fell to $0.25 in 2023, rallied 384% to $1.21 by the end of 2024, and then dropped 86% to $0.17.

On technology, Hoskinson pointed to the extended UTXO model, which follows Bitcoin's transaction-output approach but supports programmable smart contracts. He said it can be changed to handle threats such as quantum computing. He also cited Ouroboros Leios, which is meant to add transaction-processing capacity alongside the existing Praos chain. The Crypto Basic reported that Leios is running on the public Musashi testnet, which has operated since June, and that an earlier testing phase reached about six times current mainnet throughput under synthetic load. Leios is not yet active on mainnet. Intersect's Nov. 6 update said Node 11.3, intended to include the complete Dijkstra feature set and Linear Leios, was at least two to three weeks from a release candidate. A Nov. 11 Cardano Foundation update said Node 11.3 is expected in December and that further testnet tuning is needed. The Dijkstra hard fork also remains subject to on-chain governance.

Background

Cardano's roadmap was organized into five eras. Byron launched the network in September 2017; Shelley added staking in July 2020; Goguen introduced smart contracts through the Alonzo hard fork in September 2021; Basho brought scaling through the Vasil upgrade in September 2022; and Voltaire began with the Chang hard fork in September 2024. Decrypt reported that the Plomin hard fork in January 2025 gave ADA holders voting power and completed the transition to full decentralized governance, which Hoskinson treats as the end of the roadmap.

What to watch

Investors and developers will watch whether Leios and Node 11.3 move from testing to mainnet, and whether the Dijkstra hard fork clears Cardano's governance process. They will also watch whether projects such as RealFi, Midnight and Pogun can convert the network's technical base into sustained usage. Hoskinson's store-of-value argument may remain a founder's assessment, but the adoption test is concrete: whether those applications bring users and activity to Cardano.

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