Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson outlined an aggressive 2026 strategy to expand the blockchain's decentralized finance capabilities across multiple ecosystems, targeting integrations with Bitcoin and XRP DeFi along with new bridges, oracles, stablecoins, and the privacy-focused Midnight network.

What Happened: Hoskinson Unveils Cross-Chain DeFi Strategy

In a Jan. 9, 2026, video update from Colorado, Hoskinson described the year as an execution cycle centered on the "Pentad" integrations effort, which he positioned as infrastructure for liquidity and users to flow between chains.

He acknowledged that contract signings slowed during the holidays but said deals remain in progress.

Near-term announcements would include bridges, oracles, stablecoins, analytics tools, and exchange listings.

Hoskinson proposed upgrading Cardano's top 15 to 20 decentralized applications to operate on Bitcoin DeFi, XRP DeFi, and Midnight, while securing tier-one exchange listings and incubation support with a goal to increase their total value locked, users, and transaction volume tenfold.

He previewed a structured delivery schedule for the rest of 2026, describing a plan to release "a bag of goodies" every two months, which he characterized as a "death march" of shipping.

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Why It Matters: Privacy as Competitive Edge

Hoskinson argued that Cardano cannot compete by making incremental improvements over Ethereum or Solana. He said copycat strategies fail and that differentiated features would determine success.

"You beat those guys by doing something that no one's ever seen before," Hoskinson said, pointing to private stablecoins, private prediction markets, and private decentralized exchanges as the kind of products that would draw attention.

He named Solana, Ethereum, Bitcoin, XRP, BNB, and Avalanche as target ecosystems for distributing privacy-enabled Cardano applications once bridge and stablecoin infrastructure is complete.

The strategy positions privacy not as a Cardano-only feature but as a portable capability across chains.

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