Kadena (KDA) has made a outstanding closure within the historical past of cryptocurrencies as a undertaking that set out with the objective of “enterprise-level blockchain infrastructure” however halted all its actions with a sudden resolution by its crew.
Based in 2016 by Stuart Popejoy and Will Martino, engineers who left JPMorgan, Kadena aimed to create a scalable and safe proof-of-work chain that conventional finance had failed to realize. Dubbed “Chainweb,” the construction promised a capability of 480,000 transactions per second by way of parallel mesh chains, whereas its good contract language, referred to as “Pact,” stood out for its safe and error-free transaction design.
The undertaking gained vital momentum, significantly in 2021. The KDA token reached $27.64, surpassing a $3 billion market capitalization, and a few analysts dubbed it the “Solana killer.” Nonetheless, its success story was short-lived.
The bearish market sentiment that dominated the market in 2022, the rise of proof-of-stake networks, and disagreements with Kadena’s decentralized change accomplice, Kaddex, utterly sapped the undertaking’s momentum. Kadena launched a $100 million grant program that very same 12 months to revitalize its ecosystem and introduced a brand new $50 million fund in mid-2025. Regardless of this, the vast majority of the introduced grant commitments remained unused, with CurveBlock being the one publicly introduced recipient.
October 2025 marked the undertaking’s de facto finish. On October tenth, throughout the historic market crash triggered by Donald Trump’s announcement of 100% tariffs on China, the KDA value misplaced 40% of its worth in a single day, falling to $0.22. 4 days later, Kadena’s largest ecosystem accomplice, Kaddex, claimed that Kadena had blocked node entry and introduced that it could be shutting down all its companies and migrating to Ethereum. Only a week after the disaster, on October twenty first, Kadena introduced on its official account that it was ceasing all operations instantly, citing “unfavorable market situations.”
Following the announcement, the KDA token misplaced greater than 60% of its worth in two hours, falling beneath $0.09, wiping out $268 million in market capitalization and immediately growing buying and selling quantity by over 1,200%. The neighborhood initially believed the account had been compromised, however the Kadena crew confirmed the shutdown through Discord. The assertion acknowledged that the blockchain “doesn’t belong” to the corporate and that “a transition to neighborhood administration can be thought-about.”
Instantly after the shutdown, Kaddex accused Kadena staff of leveraging brief positions on exchanges and issued statements saying they had been “glad to contribute to Kadena’s collapse.” No concrete proof has been offered for these allegations, and Kadena has not responded. Some neighborhood members have urged that the undertaking could have been working on insider info main as much as its chapter, however on-chain knowledge has not confirmed this.
Consultants attribute Kadena’s collapse to poor monetary planning and miscommunication fairly than malice. The corporate’s funds, bloated with grant commitments, turned unsustainable because the token’s worth eroded. Administration allegedly knew the funds would run out months earlier than the closure, but continued to advertise “job progress” and “ecosystem progress.” This implies the undertaking was pushed by a “repute safety” reflex fairly than a “neighborhood precedence.”
Regardless of this, Kadena’s technological basis stays purposeful. The Chainweb community continues to provide blocks, and the 566 million KDA emission plan, which runs till 2139, is technically energetic. Nonetheless, with out management, neighborhood, and monetary assist, the construction has successfully grow to be an empty shell. Within the phrases of 1 neighborhood member, “Kadena is not useless; it is deserted.”
In the end, Kadena began with the arrogance of its Wall Road background, however ended up with the paperwork, infighting, and miscommunication that got here with that very same company mindset.
*This isn’t funding recommendation.
