Welcome to the Cardano Community Digest!
Published by the Cardano Foundation Community Team every two weeks, this Digest will provide you with news, updates and events about the project and ecosystem!
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In this edition of the Community Digest, we highlight
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Arouet & Orion Fund: Applications are opening for a Community Director position on the Arouet Holdings Board, while Draper University has launched applications for the first Orion Fund founder cohort supporting Cardano startups.
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Ouroboros Leios Testnet: The Musashi Dojo testnet is now live, marking an important milestone for Cardano’s next-generation scaling upgrade and providing SPOs with opportunities to prepare for mainnet deployment.
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CIP Updates: New discussions focus on DRep voting power concentration, while proposals covering the Net Change Limit and utilization-scaled pledge bonuses continue through active review.
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Community Newsletters: Recent updates from Cardanians and Lucas Macchiavelli cover the growth of Midnight’s NIGHT token, the launch of Pyth Network on Cardano, the Orion Fund, VESPR’s Cardano MCP server, and other ecosystem developments.
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Community Learning & Developer Engagement: Recent Developers Office Hours explored the road to v1.0 for elm-cardano and Dolos, a lightweight Rust-based Cardano data node from TxPipe.
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Cardano Foundation Updates: The Foundation highlighted its inclusion in Fortune’s Crypto Innovators 2026 list, participation in institutional blockchain discussions through the GBBC, new educational content from Cardano Academy, and tooling advancements including BloxBean’s Analytics Store and Yaci DevKit.
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Intersect MBO Updates: Intersect shared updates on the Constitutional Committee Election, the van Rossem hard fork governance action, ecosystem readiness for Node 11, and support initiatives tied to Pyth Network’s launch on Cardano.
All this and more in today’s Digest.
Arouet Community Director Applications Open, Orion Fund Founder Cohort Now Accepting Applicants
On June 15, Arouet Holdings announced a call for applications for a voluntary Community Director position on its Board of Directors. Arouet is a specialized investment vehicle established to manage and grow Cardano Treasury investments as part of the Draper Dragon $80M Orion Fund initiative, with a focus on generating long-term returns through investments in Real-World Assets (RWA) and institutional DeFi. The selected Community Director will help oversee reporting, governance, and community transparency related to the fund. Applications open June 29 and close August 3, with DRep voting expected in October. Read more: Call for Applications: Voluntary Cardano Community Director
Draper University has also announced that applications are now open for the first Orion Fund founder cohort: https://draperuniversity.com/cardanoprograms. You can also check out their announcement video here
Ouroboros Leios Now Live on Testnet
The highly anticipated Ouroboros Leios testnet, called Musashi Dojo after the legendary samurai Miyamoto Musashi, launched June 23, 2026 as Cardano’s next-generation scaling upgrade. In a recent BLOCK//45 interview with hosts Lily Brodi and Cardano With Paul, Carlos Lopez De Lara, product manager at Input Output Group, explained how Leios will transform the network by introducing “endorser blocks” that run in parallel with traditional Praos blocks, significantly increasing throughput without sacrificing security.
According to Carlos, “Cardano can scale from its current throughput of 4.5 KB/s up to 200 KB/s.” He also highlighted the need for a slow start, as a rapid increase might imply additional costs for SPOs, which is not needed at the moment.
De Lara also confirmed that the Musashi Dojo Testnet is structured into five distinct phases: Earth, Water, Fire, Wind, and Void, with the Fire phase being critical for SPO participation.
In a separate video, released by the IOG team, Carlos shared how SPOs can participate in the “training camp” to prepare for the mainnet launch, which is targeted for late 2026.
Want to learn how to get involve:: https://leios.cardano-scaling.org/ and Block//45 - Leios Interview with Carlos Lopez De Lara - Input | Output
RealFi Exploring Single Pool Accelerator for Cardano SPOs
Ben O’Hanlon is seeking expressions of interest from single stake pool operators with approximately 1M–12M ADA delegated stake as part of research into a potential Single Pool Accelerator tied to RealFi’s upcoming launch on Cardano.
The initiative aims to explore ways selected single pool operators could help bootstrap the RealFi ecosystem while strengthening Cardano’s decentralization. Concepts under consideration include potential early access opportunities and other benefits for delegators, subject to tokenomics design, legal review, and approval from the RealFi team.
This is currently a research initiative and not an offer. Eligible SPOs interested in participating are encouraged to submit an expression of interest.
For additional details, context, and the registration form, see Ben O’Hanlon’s thread:
Cardano Improvement Proposals (CIP) Updates
The Cardano Improvement Proposal (CIP) process lets any stakeholder propose changes to the protocol. Proposals can be technical (address formats, transaction metadata) or conceptual, framed as a Cardano Problem Statement (CPS). They enter open review, gather feedback from the ecosystem, and either advance toward adoption or remain as reference material. We cover significant proposals bi-weekly. This snapshot comes from Robert Phair.
New Proposals
DRep Voting Power Concentration - a proposed CPS beginning with a comprehensive summary of this currently identified community concern: proceeding though several scenarios for possible improvement, means of identifying technical solutions, and points for debate by developers, governance advocates, and the community.
Active Review
CIP-0173 candidate: Net Change Limit Parameter - provides the ability to constrain NCL in the protocol itself instead of simply through budget guardrail processes. Last call for review on CIP before turning over this proposition to advocacy in the Cardano community and then (if sufficient support) the governance process.
CIP-0187 candidate Utilization-Scaled Pledge Bonus - a proposed change to Cardano’s current RSS (Reward Sharing Scheme) equation, with a novel approach to encourage decentralisation without introducing or agreeing upon any new protocol parameters. Includes links to interactive tutorials and analytical tools to investigate this & similar RSS proposals.
Cardanians: Weekly Ecosystem Updates
On June 22, 2026, Cardanians released its latest Ecosystem Newsletter, highlighting several developments across the Cardano ecosystem. According to the update, Midnight’s $NIGHT token has surpassed 76,300 holders, making it the largest Cardano-native token by market capitalization and one of the largest by holder count. The newsletter also notes that TapTools has paused its operations after announcing earlier this month that it could no longer sustain its platform from a technical and economic standpoint.
Additionally, Cardanians shared a list of alternative tools for users seeking replacements for TapTools, including platforms focused on token analytics, DeFi data, trading activity, and ecosystem insights. For this and more, view the X thread.
Cardano Newsletter: Weekly Cardano Digest #131
On June 20, 2026, Cardano Ambassador Lucas Macchiavelli released the latest Weekly Cardano Digest (#131), highlighting several developments across the ecosystem. According to the update, Pyth Network is now live on Cardano, bringing institutional-grade oracle price feeds to builders and offering projects free access to its professional API for one year. The digest also covers the official launch of Draper Dragon’s $80 million Orion Fund, which has opened applications for its first cohort to support early-stage Cardano startups focused on real-world assets and DeFi.
And that’s not all, as it also highlights VESPR’s release of a Cardano MCP server, enabling AI assistants and agents to access live on-chain data, including wallet information, transactions, staking data, and asset metadata. For this and more, read the full Weekly Cardano Digest.
Spotlight on Cardano Content Creators
This week, we’re shining a light on some of Cardano’s community-driven content creators and ecosystem contributors. Across interviews, educational sessions, technical deep dives, and community discussions, these individuals and teams continue to help make Cardano more accessible, informative, and engaging for builders and community members alike. Here are a few recent highlights from across the ecosystem:
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Peter Bui (Cardano Ambassador)
Peter’s latest interview takes a closer look at the Cardano Prime proposal with AlphaGrowth’s Bryan Colligan and Eric Waisanen. The discussion centers on Cardano’s missing DeFi infrastructure, from stablecoin liquidity and money markets to bridges and oracle networks, and how a treasury-funded initiative could help address those gaps. The conversation also explores accountability, transparency, and whether the proposed phased approach can realistically accelerate Cardano DeFi growth before the end of the year: Watch It Here -
Lilly
Lilly explains Cardano’s biggest scaling upgrade, Ouroboros Leios, now live on testnet (Musashi Dojo). It adds parallel “endorser blocks” to boost throughput dramatically, from ~4.5 KB/s toward 200 KB/s, without sacrificing security or decentralization: Check out her video here on X.
Community Learning & Developer Engagement
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Road to v1.0 for elm-cardano | Developers Office Hour - In this session, Matthieu Pizenberg, Senior Software Engineer at the Cardano Foundation, explores the development of elm-cardano and the path toward its first major stable release. The discussion covers recent progress, upcoming milestones, and how Elm’s strong type system and reliability can help developers build safer, more robust Cardano. The full episode can be viewed here.
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Dolos: A Lightweight Cardano Data Node in Rust | Developers Office Hour - In this session, Santiago Carmuega, CEO and Founder of TxPipe, introduces Dolos, a Rust-based data node designed for efficient ledger queries and state tracking. The discussion covers the data node concept, how Dolos overcomes limitations of traditional nodes, its Pallas-powered architecture, and real-world use cases for developers. The full episode can be viewed here.
Updates from the Cardano Foundation
The Cardano Foundation has shared several recent updates, highlighting progress across global recognition, institutional partnerships, advanced data analytics, and educational initiatives.
The Foundation was highly visible this week, with key achievements framing Cardano as a leader in institutional-grade, resilient blockchain infrastructure. Notably, Cardano has been included on Fortune’s Crypto Innovators 2026 list. This prestigious recognition reflects almost nine years of continuous operation, sustained protocol development, and growing adoption across multiple sectors. Inclusion by an established global business publication such as Fortune signals the rapid institutionalization of digital assets and their growing importance to investors, businesses, and markets worldwide. Read here the Foundation’s announcement.
Expanding its institutional reach, the Cardano Foundation is partnering with the Global Blockchain Business Council (GBBC) on a roundtable during the Point Zero Forum in Zurich. The roundtable centers on GBBC’s Capital Markets Risk Mitigation Framework (RMF)—an industry-led initiative facilitated by GBBC and Oliver Wyman that brings together financial institutions and blockchain infrastructure providers to support the secure adoption of public blockchains by regulated institutions. Read the update here.
On the leadership front, Cardano Foundation CEO Frederik Gregaard sat down with Camila Russo at The Defiant to share insights into what real decentralized governance looks like. The discussion provided an in-depth read on the Cardano Foundation roadmap, the Cardano 2030 Vision, and the multiple community initiatives driving the ecosystem forward. Watch the interview here.
Furthering its efforts to increase network visibility and onboarding, the Foundation highlighted the success of its Unified Global Events Marketing Strategy through a new post and video breakdown, demonstrating how a cohesive global brand presence is accelerating ecosystem collaboration.
In technical infrastructure and tooling, the Foundation showcased BloxBean’s Analytics Store, a solution that radically simplifies how users interact with network data without the need to run independent infrastructure. The Analytics Store packages the entire chain’s history—including blocks, transactions, stake, rewards, and governance—into open, downloadable files small enough to explore on a regular laptop. It is entirely free to use and build upon. Get all the details here. This technical momentum is further supported by the release of Yaci DevKit 0.12.0-beta5, which adds PV11 and Node 11.0.1 support and ships with Yano, a lightweight Cardano devnet node designed to bootstrap networks rapidly. View the release here.
On the educational side, the Cardano Academy released a new short-format video designed to clearly communicate Cardano’s architecture as a third-generation blockchain. Watch the video here.
Rounding things out, the latest episode of the Let’s Talk Cardano series featured an insightful interview with Christian Yan Zhang, CEO of the Metaverse Institute. The discussion explored the intersection of public ledger technology and macroeconomics, specifically examining how national debt can be tokenized securely on-chain. Listen to the interview here.
Update from Intersect MBO
For the past week, Intersect Weekly Update #116 highlighted several milestones that definitely are worth your attention. On the governance front, just in case you missed it, the candidate registration window for the Constitutional Committee Election officially closed on June 21. Just before the deadline, five candidates successfully registered for the four available seats. DRep voting begins at the epoch boundary on June 23 and runs through July 23. The four candidates with the highest voting power will fill the four available seats.
If you have been following Intersect’s social channels over the past week, you will have seen that they are heavily highlighting a proud moment for Cardano governance. Across their X feed, the spotlight has been on the van Rossem hard fork initiation governance action officially going live on mainnet. This intra-era upgrade is a massive milestone that lays the groundwork for the highly anticipated Dijkstra era, which will ultimately bring Leios to the mainnet. Intersect has been sharing impressive adoption metrics, noting that SPOs have shown strong support with 85% of block production occurring on node version 11, while major exchanges are actively in the process of upgrading their infrastructure to meet the new network requirements.
Finally, Intersect has also been amplifying some exciting ecosystem partnerships this week, specifically highlighting that the Pyth Network is now live on Cardano. To celebrate and support developers building within the ecosystem, they shared an initiative offering a free one-year Pyth Pro subscription for projects needing reliable oracle price feeds, reinforcing their ongoing commitment to expanding developer tooling and infrastructure.
Cardano Forum Top 10 Referred Topics
Topics that have received the most clicks from external sources. (last 10 Days)
- How to boost the cardano price? we need to do something
- Many Great Cardano Pools Stay Invisible — Can We Change That?
- Cardano - Node diversity workshop in Porto - June 2026
- Could Stablecoin Revenue Help Fund Cardano Growth?
- 카르다노: 3세대 블록체인의 비전 & 카르다노 생태계 현황 — 2026년 6월 솔직한 진단
- NIGHT claim error and calculation error
- DR Congo Cardano & Web3 Community Call #2
- PCP_rho_tau_JonathanNikkel
- Τί συμβαίνει σήμερα στο CARDANO;
- SPANISH DUBBING Más Comentarios sobre Discord | CH 16 Jun 2026
Upcoming Community Events
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06-24 DRep Monthly Call: Join Tweag by Modus Create and Intersect for the monthly DRep community call. Held on the last Wednesday of every month at 3pm UTC, these sessions provide a space for DReps and community members to discuss active governance actions, upcoming votes, treasury and budget discussions, governance tooling, and wider ecosystem developments. Each call includes governance updates, a featured topic or guest speaker, open Q&A, and opportunities for attendees to share perspectives and experiences- More Details Here
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06-26 Developers Office Hours #66 - Scalus Development Platform: Join Alex Nemish (CTO & Founder) and Oleksii Khodakivskyi (CEO & Co-founder) for a look at the future of the Scalus Development Platform. They’ll reflect on what was delivered over the past year, share the long-term vision for Scalus, discuss upcoming milestones, and explore ways for the community to get involved - More Details Here
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06-26 Cardano Project Showcase || June Edition || With 45B: This month, we’re excited to host 45B, a team dedicated to driving Cardano adoption through education, community building, business enablement, and user-focused solutions. Join us as we explore:
The mission behind 45B Cardano adoption and onboarding Building sustainable communities Opportunities within the ecosystem The future of Cardano growth, and more. More Details Here
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06-30 Hydra Working Group (Worldwide 15:00 UTC): The goal of this call is to bring Hydra builders, users, and potential adopters together to discuss pain points, blockers, and opportunities. This is the first step towards forming a Hydra Alliance - a community-governed approach to Hydra’s roadmap and development: More details Here.
For more weekly events, visit Cardano Events
Many thanks and greetings from the Community Team!