'Cardano on Fire': Five Major Moves Fuel Bullish 2026 Outlook - U.Today

Cardano is seeing positive energy in 2026, with Cardano community X account Cardanians outlining five major developments since the year began.

These advancements include CIP for Leios progress, Midnight perpetual futures listed on Coinbase, ADA included in new ETF applications, Google Cloud stake pool launch on testnet as well as critical new integrations to be announced soon.

IOG’s public Leios tracker shows that the Cardano Improvement Proposal is 83% complete, and delivery work is actively progressing across specifications, simulations and implementation.

Perpetual futures trading for Midnight (NIGHT) went live on Coinbase today, Jan. 15. The NIGHT-PERP market is now in full trading mode on Coinbase International Exchange and Coinbase Advanced, according to a recent announcement by Coinbase Markets X account.

This week, Cyber Hornet filed an S-1 with the SEC for the Cyber Hornet S&P Crypto 10 ETF. The ETF will provide exposure to the top 10 cryptocurrencies weighted by market cap, including Cardano.

ProShares also filed for registration of ProShares CoinDesk Crypto 20 ETF, with Cardano having a 3.1% allocation in the index.

New integrations anticipated

Critical new integrations are set to be announced soon, sparking expectations in the Cardano community. In a recent update on X, Phillip Pon, CEO of Emurgo, responded to expectations on the tier-1 integrations for Cardano ADA under PENTAD, saying that at least two contracts are under review, with more news to be shared soon.

Google Cloud appears to have launched a Cardano stake pool in the preview testnet. This move aligns with Midnight’s announcement that Google Cloud will validate the network.

Intersect, a member-based organization in the Cardano ecosystem, stated it had submitted a governance action proposing an increase to Plutus memory unit limits per transaction and per block on behalf of the Technical Steering Committee.

Intersect noted this as the first phase in a two-step process. The change is intended to reduce friction for smart contract development while maintaining network performance and security.