Cardano Founder Responds to Criticism — Genesis ADA Was Profit, Not Community Assets - Crypto Economy

TL;DR

• The Cardano founder said the Genesis ADA allocations were private earnings for early work and risk, and are not part of a community treasury.
• The request for 70 million ADA from the treasury reignited the dispute, but Hoskinson noted that many of the integrations did not even exist when Genesis ADA was defined.
• The underlying debate points to a governance shift coming in 2026, with a five-entity executive layer and a more coordinated model to support the ecosystem’s evolution.

Cardano is once again debating an issue that never fully went away: the Genesis ADA allocations and their role in the current ecosystem.

Charles Hoskinson moved to settle the matter at its roots. He explained that those tokens are not part of a community treasury and were never meant to fund future integrations. He said they were private earnings derived from the work done in the early days and from the risks taken when the project could have failed easily.

The founder recalled that IO and EMURGO received their portions under a clear agreement: those allocations were rewards for building the original infrastructure, funding early operations, and supporting a project that had no guarantee of survival. The Japanese crowdsale that provided the initial capital already accounted for this structure, and every participant accepted the conditions that combined technical uncertainty, regulatory pressure, and real financial risk. He also stressed that the early buyers have already recovered their investment under the agreed-upon terms.

Cardano Prepares to Reshape Its Executive Layer

The dispute resurfaced because of a request for 70 million ADA from the on-chain treasury to fund integrations with oracles, stablecoin issuers, and other providers. Some community members argue that Genesis ADA should cover that expense. Hoskinson rejects that view because many of today’s integrations did not exist when the initial allocation was set, making the expectation retroactive and unfounded. He added that the 70 million ADA will not cover all costs and that entities such as IO and the Midnight Foundation will contribute additional resources thanks to their ADA and KNIGHT holdings.


In his view, the real debate lies elsewhere. Cardano is preparing for a structural shift in 2026 that will replace the three-entity model with a five-member executive layer: IO, EMURGO, the Cardano Foundation, the Midnight Foundation, and Intersect. This coordination aims to secure strategic deals in a market where competitors operate with greater scale and commercial pressure. Hoskinson argues that the ecosystem needs a unified strategy and a governance model capable of executing decisions without dragging out endless debates.

He also emphasized that IO and EMURGO are private companies and do not operate as public utilities subject to community demands over their balance sheets. Their responsibility is limited to delivering the work they commit to.

Hoskinson ended his message plainly: the outcome of Genesis ADA is already settled. The challenge now is deciding whether the community accepts the framework proposed for 2026 and funds the infrastructure needed to drive Cardano’s next phase