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Crypto analyst Ali Martinez informed his over 164,000 followers on social media platform X that he has identified what he considers the least useful blockchain, whose team fails to meet its commitments.
Martinez criticized the Cardano ecosystem for its total value locked (TVL) never surpassing the promised threshold of $1 billion. According to DeFiLlama, last year Cardano’s TVL peaked at around $700 million, but it currently stands at only $136 million. Martinez noted that this is merely a fraction of the amounts locked on competing platforms, such as Ethereum.
In comparison, Ethereum’s TVL currently reaches an impressive $55 billion, although this is nearly half of the $100 billion achieved last year. The corresponding figure for Solana surged to over $12 billion in September 2025 but has since dropped to $6.6 billion.
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“Unlike Ethereum, which has established a dominant position in the decentralized finance (DeFi) market, or Solana, which has captured the high-speed application market, Cardano still lacks a clear use case that attracts users, developers, and investors,” Martinez stated.
He reminded that Cardano was officially launched nine years ago, yet smart contracts were only introduced to the network in 2021. Due to Cardano’s sluggishness, competitors have been able to develop their blockchains more rapidly and attract more developers and liquidity. Martinez explained that blockchains that enhance their scalability in the early stages typically draw more capital due to network activity.
Currently, the cryptocurrency Cardano (ADA) is trading at $0.26 with a market capitalization of $9.5 billion. This is approximately 91.7% lower than its peak of $3.1 reached in September 2021. Martinez suggested that if ADA cannot maintain the $0.24 level, it risks plummeting by 50–80%, down to $0.112 or even $0.051.
Previously, Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson promised that the Midnight sidechain, aimed at enhancing transaction privacy, would expand the ecosystem of his blockchain tenfold.
