Cardano Analysis and Explanation

Cardano analysis shows that the network offers a resilient and scalable blockchain using a Proof of Stake consensus process. Designed to conduct transactions, the blockchain platform Cardano uses its native cryptocurrency, ADA, to facilitate the process.

Founded in 2015 and made public in 2017, Cardano is a decentralised blockchain. Since it doesn't rely on cryptocurrency mining, it is more energy-efficient and scalable. It has established itself as a competitor to PoW blockchains like Bitcoin.

The goals for Cardano's development are significant. As per the developers, when voting and treasury management on the blockchain are added to Cardano's capabilities, it will eventually become completely decentralised.

While the Cardano platform can handle any transaction, its ultimate goal is to establish an ecosystem that enables smooth interoperability across various blockchains. Let's move into some more detailed Cardano analysis.

Cardano analysis: It ranks way ahead of its competitors in terms of decentralised nature

The first significant benefit our Cardano analysis reveals is how decentralised the network is. For instance, it provides more than 3,100 staking pools and has staked 70% of the circulating supply. If you look at the numbers, you'll have to agree that Cardano is among the best compared to other Layer 1 blockchains. Cardano's 3,100 validators put it far ahead of its rivals, with Avalanche having 1,200 and Solana with 1,900 validators.

If we pay more attention, we can notice that 22% of the active holdings and 72% of the total pools are operated by single pool operators. This is fantastic since these smaller single pool operators should gain a more significant stake than a small number of large corporations to control everything. Speaking of influential organisations, Binance has the largest staking group, yet it only represents 11% of the total stake. Things seem to be going exceptionally well in decentralisation.

The K parameter for Cardano is the primary reason for their decentralised nature. People are motivated to spread out their state when a pool is oversaturated since it reduces the staking reward. Also, the community of Cardano is quite proud of its decentralisation, which is the second factor.

Being decentralised has its benefits. First, users can always use their coins and tokens thanks to a decentralised infrastructure. A contract's conditions, such as those of a loan, cannot be altered by either party. No third party can stop someone from spending coins or tokens that they have in their wallet. If the coins are secured in a smart contract, the conditions for possession and release will be explicit. The global network that is run by thousands of people all across the world is almost impossible to stop.

Proof of Stake vs Proof of Work

Continuing our Cardano analysis, let's look at the different algorithms.

On a blockchain network, Proof of Work and Proof of Stake algorithms are used to validate cryptocurrencies. The primary distinction is how they select and qualify users to add transactions.

The PoW consensus algorithm involves challenging puzzles that powerful computers used by miners must solve. Using trial and error methods, the issues are resolved.

The ability to add new blocks for transactions to the blockchain belongs to the first miner who solves the problem or cryptographic equation. The transaction is then added to the blockchain once the miner has verified the block. The miners receive compensation for their participation in the form of digital coins, which they could later sell on the crypto exchanges or hold as part of an investment strategy.

Staking in a PoS system performs similarly to mining in a proof of work system. It selects a network participant to add the most recent transactions to the blockchain and receive cryptocurrency in return.

While PoS operates on the idea of staking, PoW entails competing to solve a challenging mathematical problem to get the opportunity to verify the block. Because the two systems operate on fundamentally different principles, PoS can perform the same purpose as PoW while using only a tiny amount of energy. And for this reason, Cardano is way more environmentally friendly than others like Bitcoin and Litecoin.

Cardano's major network upgrade - Vasil hard fork

Any Cardano analysis must take account of the Vasil hard fork. It was intended to improve the platform's transaction throughput rates, DApp development potential, security, and usability in general. On 22 September, Cardano's long-awaited Vasil upgrade finally went live after several delays and setbacks. The hard fork is intended to boost Cardano's decentralised apps (DApps) development potential and to increase the ecosystem's scalability and general transaction throughput capacity from the outside. A hard fork is a network upgrade when the people in charge of a blockchain platform want to add or change specific features to the ecosystem.

The improvement will increase the ecosystem's transaction effectiveness and block latency rates. Diffusion pipelining, a method that aims to speed up block propagation times while boosting the network's transaction processing capacity, will also be used due to the hard fork. It will increase scalability, smart contracts' potency, and interoperability between Cardano's blockchain and other blockchains.

Smart contract platform of the Cardano blockchain - Plutus

Cardano's Plutus significantly differs from Ethereum's Solidity. Since they come from two entirely distinct programming paradigms, it shouldn't be surprising that they are quite different in almost every way. There are many advantages to the Plutus language, but most result from using a functional programming language. As a result, their smart contracts are simpler to verify, and you can demonstrate mathematically that they will behave as you anticipate. There are also less strange edge circumstances that could mistakenly result in a million-dollar hack in general.

Plutus makes it possible to construct distributed applications and smart contracts using an innovative integrated method that is more practical and secure than previous options. The same language is used in both on-chain and off-chain code.

Cardano analysis: Two layers of blockchain

A settlement layer (CSL) and a computation layer (CCL), which operate as the essential building blocks of every transaction, comprise the third-generation blockchain platform that makes up the Cardano ecosystem.

Cardano Settlement Layer (CSL)

To isolate a transaction's value from its computational data, Cardano's inventors set out to create a system. The Cardano Settlement Layer controls the exchange of value or currency between the sender and the recipient. In other words, the routing layer for all control layers and systems is the settlement layer.

The CSL uses two specialised scripting languages, Plutus and Marlowe, to shift the value and extend support for the overlay network protocol.

Cardano Computation Layer (CCL)

The foundation of Cardano's CCL implementation is its capacity to support the long-term scaling of specialised protocols. As technology develops, this entails adding hardware security modules (HSM) to the current stack of protocols.

The two layers of the Cardano blockchain enable the ecosystem to proactively adopt modifications to promote quicker and more secure transactions while removing any user metadata that turns out unnecessary for the procedure.

Cardano analysis: Tokenomics

Every epoch (five days) on the Cardano Network, Cardano validators (pool operators) and their respective delegators receive incentives. Rewards come from both monetary expansion and transaction fees.

The reserve, established by the difference between the total supply of ADA and the maximum supply of ADA, is where the monetary expansion originates from. The total supply of ADA comprises both the ADA held in the treasury and all ADA that is currently in use. The maximal supply of ADA, however, is 45 billion.

Our Cardano analysis shows that 0.3% of the reserve is given as staking rewards and treasury financing with each epoch. This will continue until exhaustion after a few years.

ADA - The native token

The maximum quantity of ADA, the native token of Cardano, is 45 billion tokens. Cardano analysis reveals as that 34.4B ADA are in circulation as of November 2022.

In total, 25.927 billion ADA were sold to investors during the genesis block distribution. Of that sum, 5,185,414,108 ADA, or 20%, were distributed to the three significant corporations (IOHK, EMURGO, and Cardano Foundation).

As a result, during Cardano's official launch, 31,112,484,646 ADA was available, with a total of 13,887,515,354 ADA set aside as the reserve for staking incentivisation.

Staking ADA

Pool operators, also known as validators, charge a commission for their operations, which include running staking pools. Delegators receive staking rewards based on how much they have pledged. Staking income is automatically distributed and compounded by the protocol every five days - one epoch.

There is no lock-up time, and delegators can choose and delegate to any staking pool. There is no unbounding period; stakers can withdraw their payouts whenever they want.

However, Cardano's analysis reveals that it takes three epochs, or about 15-20 days, for the original stake to start yielding returns.

The treasury receives 20% of all income earned, and the expansion rate is currently set at 0.3%. The delegator makes according to their stake amount minus the commission charge, depending on how well the pool performs. At the current pace, delegators might anticipate a total annual percentage yield of about 5%.

Cardano analysis: eUtxo is superior to account-based architecture

Using a mechanism known as extended Utxo(eUtxo), Cardano has a distinctive method for maintaining records for their blockchain.

The Cardano analysis shows that the network chose to abandon the account-based architecture in favour of something more like Bitcoin's Utxo model because, as you can see, it wanted to be different from Ethereum.

First, in this section of Cardano analysis, let's concentrate on eUtxo's benefits. eUtxo allows you to produce a transaction or output from your address as long as you have the required number of inputs into it. Given that all necessary inputs are present, Cardano transactions have the unique virtue of being guaranteed to execute. This is a vastly superior alternative compared to account-based systems, where transactions frequently fail if the network changes while they are being processed.

Second, as long as they do not use the same inputs, the eUtxo architecture enables Cardano nodes to perform transactions in parallel. They are far more scalable than account-based systems, which handle transactions one at a time within a block. Additionally, transaction fees can be precisely calculated before a transaction is sent. It is far better for users than Ethereum, where we occasionally send a transaction, but the cost is much greater than anticipated. There are many more advantages to eUtxo, but these should help you understand why Cardano chose this model over others used by their competitors.

Cardano Ballot: The decentralised voting app

Despite the fact that the Cardano Ballot was created only for the Cardano Summit 2022, it sparked debates about an enterprise-grade solution and the steps necessary to deploy it. Cardano's Metadata Tools team, notably the Cardano Foundation, is mindful of the expanding research and development towards self-sovereign identification (SSI). We could expect more from the Cardano team in this direction.

The Metadata Tools team came across both respectable elements within the Cardano development environment and places that may use further research and development throughout designing and creating the Cardano Ballot. They are now compiling and evaluating future directions for enhancing the Cardano development and user experience to continue their collaborative work with the ecosystem.

Cardano analysis: The Etter Edition 01

Etter Edition 01, a collaborative effort by Christian Etter and Alexander E. Brunner that combines physical and NFT generative art, was facilitated by the Cardano Foundation. The Swiss-based Web3 infrastructure company NMKR issued the Etter Edition 01 NFTs, which are redeemable on the Cardano blockchain for actual works of art.

Cardano analysis confirms that the physical version of Etter Edition 01 will feature generative motion graphics identical to those used in the Cardano blockchain's digital NFT version. The project is an example of how Cardano can make it easier to create NFTs with sophisticated metadata features.

The NFT can also be purchased with any currency, demonstrating the outstanding interoperability possibilities the Cardano ecosystem offers. A decentralised algorithm inside the artwork alters the painting endlessly throughout time, fusing the distinctive characteristics of the physical and the digital worlds. The algorithm will be guaranteed to be authentic and unchanged by this ground-breaking usage of the Cardano blockchain, making the code a crucial component of the artwork.