Here’s why Cardano price has crashed and erased $84 billion in value

Here’s why Cardano price has crashed and erased $84 billion in value
Crispus Nyaga
09 Jun 2026, 12:34 PM

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Short ADA/Buy ETH

Pair trade: short ADA, buy Ethereum (ETH). If Cardano is losing developers and market share while Ethereum keeps capturing DeFi and stablecoin activity, relative performance should keep favoring ETH. The article contrasts TVL and stablecoin supply: ADA is tiny versus ETH’s billions, so the gap can widen even if crypto overall is flat.

Key Risk: Ethereum faces a major demand shock (regulatory hit, security failure, or DeFi collapse) that drags ETH down as much as ADA.

Sell ADA

Sell Cardano (ADA). The article’s core is “ghost chain”: tiny DeFi TVL (<$100M), minimal stablecoin supply (~$35M), near-zero network revenue (~$374k this year), and no spot ETF filings—signals of weak demand. Chart confirms: weekly head-and-shoulders, below all moving averages, under Ichimoku cloud, hovering at the neckline. Downside target is $0.1500.

Key Risk: A sudden wave of real usage—new major dApps/TVL and sustained on-chain growth—reverses the “ghost chain” narrative and forces a trend change.

  • Cardano price has crashed from a record high of $3 to $0.2300.
  • Charles Hoskinson’s crypto project has become a ghost chain.
  • Technicals and fundamentals suggest that the ADA price will crash further.

Cardano ADA price has crashed deeper than other altcoins this year, and is now hovering near its all-time low. It was trading at $0.1660 on Tuesday, down sharply from the record high of $3. This retreat has erased over $84 billion in value as the market cap has dropped from over $90 billion to $6 billion today. 

Cardano price has crashed amid ghost chain claims

ADA price has been in a strong downward trend for a long time. After peaking at $3 in 2021, it has continued its strong crash, with all rebounds becoming good selling opportunities. 

The ongoing Cardano price crash is mostly because it has become a ghost chain who few people use. This is a big issue because Cardano was envisioned as the next big thing in the crypto industry. 

At some point, it was widely seen as the best alternative to Ethereum, a blockchain project that was once known for its slow speeds, high carbon emissions, and high transaction costs. 

Years later, Cardano has become a ghost chain. Developers have fled and users have largely abandone it. It has also been overtaken by other chains that launched years after Charles Hoskinson started it. 

A good example of this is in the decentralized finance (DeFi) industry, where Cardano has a total value locked (TVL) of less than $100 million. In contrast, Ethereum and Solana have billions of dollars in value. 

Cardano has just $35 million in stablecoin supply, a tiny amount in an industry with over $317 billion. It has no market share in the booming Real-World Asset (RWA) tokenization industry. 

As a result, data shows that the network is no longer making money. According to DeFi Llama, data shows that the network has made just $374,000 this year, a tiny amount for a crypto project worth over $6 billion.

These metrics explain why no company has filed for a spot Cardano ETF despite its market capitalization.

Efforts to save Cardano are not working

There are signs that efforts to save Cardano are not working. For example, Charles Hoskinson and the team launched Midnight, a privacy-focused blockchain project. 

NIGHT, its token, saw its market capitalization jump to over $1.4 billion, a figure that has retreated to $533 million. There are signs that activity in Midnight has largely stalled and there are no major dApps in the ecosystem. 

Cardano also launched a major project to attract developers. For example, it launched a partnership with Pyth Network, a major player in the oracle space. Still, despite this, developers have not moved to the network.

Cardano is also working on the Leios upgrade, which aims to make it a faster network by introducing parallel processing. Still, it is unclear whether developers will embrace the network

ADA price technical analysis

cardano price

Cardano price chart | Source: TradingView

The weekly chart shows that ADA price has crashed in the past few months. It formed a head-and-shoulders pattern, a common bearish reversal sign in technical analysis. 

The coin has slumped below all moving averages and is now hovering at the neckline. It has moved below the Ichimoku cloud indicator.

Therefore, the token will likely continue falling in the near term. If this happens, the next key target to watch will be at $0.1500.