• Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson faces investigation as on-chain analysts allege major ADA fraud.

• ADA price has signaled bullish sentiment catalyzed by increased adoption from institutional investors. 

Cardano (ADA) price has moved in tandem with the wider altcoin market, amid anticipated altseason. The large-cap altcoin, with a fully diluted valuation of $33 billion and a 24-hour average traded volume of about $854 million, dropped around 10 percent in the past seven days to trade about $0.74 on Monday, during the late-North American trading session.

Nonetheless, ADA price has been in a recovery mode in the past few weeks akin to Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). Moreover, on-chain data analysis shows an increased capital inflow to crypto investment products, fueled by the geo-political and economic uncertainty.

Cardano Founder Under Scrutiny for Fraud Claims 

The Cardano network has found itself between thin ice as some on-chain analysis suggests a trust-misuse by founder Charles Hoskinson. According to Masato Alexander, an NFT artist, Hoskinson manipulated the Cardano network, during the 2021 Allegra hard fork, to seize control of 318 million ADA coins.

Alexander noted that Hoskinson defrauded early investors by using Genesis keys to rewrite the Cardano ledger, by redirecting unclaimed tokens from the 2017 Initial Coin Offering (ICO) into Cardano’s reserves without community approval.

“From the data we have, we know that a significant sum, totaling 318,200,635,000,000 Lovelace, which translates to 318,200,635 ADA, departed from our active set. These UTxOs, residing in 465 distinct addresses, played their part, however brief or long, in the immutable story of Cardano,” Alexander noted.

Although the top Cardano team has denied the allegations including Hoskinson, an on-chain investigation is expected to be conducted in the coming weeks.

Mid-term Expectations for ADA Price

In the daily timeframe, ADA price has established a rising trend in the past few weeks. After breaking out of a macro-falling wedge pattern in April, ADA price has gradually gained bullish momentum characterized by higher highs and higher lows. 

In the four-hour time frame, ADA price has formed a falling symmetrical parallel channel, likely a continuation pattern. A consistent close above the upper border of the falling channel will set the precedent of a fresh rally towards the short term target about $1.14.