Cardano’s Rally Pauses as Smart Contract Launch is Re-confirmed

By Fredrik Vold

The run-up for Cardanos native token ADA came to a halt today as the token corrected by 4.9% over the past 24 hours, after having soared more than 50% over the course of last week. The slight correction comes as the planned “Alonzo” upgrade, which will enable smart contracts and decentralized finance (DeFi) capabilities, moves closer with a confirmed September 12 release date.

As of press time on Tuesday (07:54 UTC), ADA traded at a price of USD 2.07, per data from CoinGecko. The price is up by nearly 40% for the past 7 days, and 75% for the past 30 days.

The token currently ranks as the third most valuable cryptoasset on CoinGecko with a market capitalization of USD 66.2bn. That is still well behind of Ethereum (ETH), but ahead of Binance Coin (BNB) and Tether (USDT) at USD 64.5bn and 64.1bn, respectively.

Also notable is that last weeks sharp rise for ADA brought it as high as USD 2.25 at its peak, the highest price recorded since it reached an all-time high of USD 2.47 back in May this year.

The recent gains for Cardano‘s ADA token have come as smart contract functionality appears to soon become a reality on the blockchain platform, which aims to challenge Ethereum’s dominance in the space.

In a Twitter update posted by the Cardano-focused research and development firm Input Output on Monday, the September 12 release of Alonzo was reaffirmed, and the team was said to be making “good progress.”

“We have been working hard over the weekend and continued to make positive progress, maintaining momentum against the timeline shared in our mid-month update. Were in a good place but there is further work ahead,” the team at Input Output further added.

We continue to remain on track for our #Alonzo #Cardano #smartcontract upgrade (via a H/F combinator event) on Sunday 12th September 2021*.

Yes. For the eagle-eyed... sorry about the typo before ？2/8 pic.twitter.com/23zBejX2G4

— Input Output (@InputOutputHK) August 16, 2021

Adding to investors confidence in the rally, blockchain analysis by analytics firm IntoTheBlock also shows some good signs for Cardano, with the onchain signals “net network growth” and the share of holders being “in the money” well into bullish territory. However, a currently negative “bid-ask volume imbalance” on exchanges pulls the overall ranking down to “mostly neutral” on the site.

And while fundamentals appear to remain strong for the token, ADAs price chart also looks healthy from a technical analysis perspective. The latest correction in the price can be seen as a “bull flag,” a bullish chart pattern that typically indicates a resumption of the uptrend later. The next line of resistance after a resumption of the trend would then be the previous all-time high of around USD 2.47