Cardano on the cusp of a major milestone, will ADA make a big move?

Following the Cardano 360 event, the platform developer Input Output Hong Kong (IOHK) has published a summary of the key points. In addition to showing a demo of a decentralized exchange like Uniswap running on Plutus, IOHK confirmed the date for “D-Day”.

Slated for March 31, Cardano’s developer announced that on this date they will hand over full control of block production to community stake pool operators. Therefore, the D-parameter, a metric that measures Cardano’s decentralization, will be reduced to 0. IOHK announced:

D-DAY CONFIRMED: Today, we have just successfully submitted an updated proposal to the #Cardano blockchain, handing over full responsibility for block production to the stake pool operator community on March 31st. This is what #Decentralization looks like. Onward!

Thus, embracing full decentralization. Cardano’s network has over 375,000 delegators and 2,350 registered pools. Cardano’s blockchain, migrated in 2020 to a consensus protocol based on Proof-of-Stake, is in its last epoch before the milestone. Cardano’s inventor Charles Hoskinson stated: “Been one hell of a journey”.

🚀Cardano’s decentralization journey: D=0 on 31 March, P2P rollout begins next
💪DevNets: 1,200+ developers onboard
✔️New IOG stake delegation: community call in early April
🧐LLVM smart contracts universality = more developers on #Cardano. Early version 6 months away 😲 2/5

— Input Output (@InputOutputHK) March 27, 2021

In parallel, IOHK stated that more than 1,200 developers are creating applications for Cardano and expect an increase with the LLVM which will give “universality” to smart contracts deployed on this platform.

Plutus, the smart contract platform, is expected to be deployed on Cardano’s third Hard Fork Combinator event Alonzo. This will occur at some point in June, following Plutus testnet due to take place in the coming months. In addition, Silvu Petricescu and Gerard Moroney, Directors of Operations and Strategy at IOHK, reveal a partnership program:

Partner strategy is actually a key element of our broader strategy which is the differentiation strategy for Plutus. What we want to achieve is basically have these professional developers complement the work that the pioneer’s program is going to help us do and achieve. So we are going to fast-track our quality assurance and testing process towards the next Hard Fork.

ADA’s short-term outlook

According to IntoTheBlock’s In/Out of the Money Around Price (IOMAP) metric, an approximate 144,000 addresses bought 3.9 billion ADA at levels between $1.12 and $1.16. Therefore, ADA’s price presents a critical support level in that area.

Analyst John Isige predicts a 21% increase in ADA’s price to $1.35 if the cryptocurrency manages to validate by closing the gap in the referenced overbought zone. Isige stated:

The Relative Strength Index (RSI) reinforced the uptrend after recovering from the oversold region. Cardano’s momentum to $1.35 is bound to continue.

ADA trades at $1,18 with moderate losses in the 24-hour chart and sideways movement in the last hour. During the past weeks, ADA has followed the general market sentiment and present an 8.3% loss.