Key Takeaways
- Cardano activated Van Rossem on July 18, 2026, reaching Protocol Version 11 with no downtime.
- Whales holding 100K to 100M ADA pushed balances to their highest level since 2023.
- Cardano now moves toward Leios, targeting over 1,000 transactions per second in 2026.
The upgrade is an intra-era change inside Cardano’s Conway ledger era. It does not replace the network’s governance structure. Instead, it lowers the cost of running Plutus smart contracts, tightens ledger security, and adds cryptographic tools developers have asked for.
Cardano built the upgrade around five Cardano Improvement Proposals. CIP-133 adds multi-scalar multiplication over BLS12-381, a function that lets the network verify thousands of signatures at once. That matters for teams building zero-knowledge proofs, multi-signature wallets and compliance tools that previously relied on off-chain computation.
Three more proposals target performance directly. CIP-138 adds a native array type for onchain data. CIP-153 optimizes how the network handles multi-asset values. CIP-132 speeds up list manipulation through a new dropList function. CIP-109 adds modular exponentiation as a built-in operation. Together, developers say these changes cut execution costs and let scripts run faster.
Security Gets a Direct Upgrade
Node operators now face a new rule. Stake pools can no longer reuse the same Verifiable Random Function key across the network. That closes a potential attack path and forces every pool to hold a unique key tied to its identity.
Cardano also tightened ledger consistency rules, a change aimed at keeping nodes aligned as transaction volume grows. Intersect MBO, the organization coordinating the Hard Fork Working Group, tracked stake pool and exchange readiness ahead of the activation and reported strong participation across both groups.
Governance Ran the Show
Unlike earlier Cardano upgrades that ran on foundation-set timelines, Van Rossem moved through the network’s onchain governance system from proposal to activation.
Delegated representatives approved the plan with 77.63% support, clearing the 60% threshold required. Stake pool operators backed it with 52.7% approval, just above the 51% bar. The Constitutional Committee voted 6-0-0-1 in favor.
Those votes closed on July 13, five days before the fork activated at the epoch boundary. Cardano describes the process as its first major upgrade fully governed by onchain voting rather than centralized coordination from Input Output, the company that built much of the network’s original codebase.
Whales Buy While Traders Wait
ADA traded at $0.16462 following the fork, down 0.88% over 24 hours. Trading volume fell 54.81% to $179.93 million in the same window, a sign that few traders acted on the news immediately.
Wallets holding between 100,000 and 100 million ADA pushed their combined balances to the highest level since 2023, according to onchain data from Santiment. Those wallets now control more than a quarter of ADA’s circulating supply. Smaller holders reduced their positions over the same period.
The gap between whale accumulation and thin trading volume points to a market still deciding what the upgrade is worth. ADA sits below its 200-day simple moving average of $0.25601, and technical support rests near $0.16185, a Fibonacci retracement level. A daily close below that mark could open a path toward $0.15. As of Sunday at 9:45 a.m. EDT, ADA trades between $0.1651 to $0.17 per coin.
What Comes Next
Van Rossem is a required step before Cardano can launch Ouroboros Leios, a parallelized consensus upgrade the network is testing through 2026. Leios targets throughput gains of 30 to 65 times current levels, with a stated goal of exceeding 1,000 transactions per second.
Developers building on Aiken and other Plutus-adjacent languages gain direct access to the new built-ins. Wallet provider Lace has already shipped a compatible update. Stake pool operators must run updated node software to stay in sync with the network.
Cardano’s next test will play out in onchain activity rather than price charts. Observers are watching total value locked (TVL), transaction counts, and decentralized application announcements for signs that developers are putting the cheaper Plutus environment to use.
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