Is Cardano (ADA) a shitcoin?
$ No. Strong fundamentals, few red flags.
Gold-meter
71/100
merit score
Shit-meter
19/100
red-flag score
Cardano: Strongest on supply soundness (98); biggest red flag is insider control (30).
— — Market Cap —
Layer 1 · Data confidence medium How much of the methodology had verified data behind this score. It says nothing about the project itself. Is this verdict fair?
Community opinion — never affects scores.
Every score is built from the indicators below. Select any line for the reasoning, raw data and source.
Goldcoin score breakdown Higher is better · total 71 Fair launch & distribution 16% of score 64
Genesis allocation to insiders measured 68 16% Launch method assessed 60 Open public sale Top-100 holders' share measured ?
Unknown Supply soundness 14% of score 98
Supply policy assessed 100 Fixed hard cap Current annual inflation measured 96 1.3% Decentralization 16% of score 68
Consensus mechanism assessed 65 Permissionless proof of stake Largest client's share measured 1 99% Nakamoto coefficient measured 100 30 Permissionless participation assessed 100 Anyone can mine or validate Reachable full / validating nodes measured 74 3,000 Usability as money 10% of score 68
Typical transaction fee (L1) assessed 65 $0.01 to $0.10 Confirmation speed (L1) assessed 70 10s to 2 min Cost to attack measured 95 ~$7B (est.) Full bear markets survived measured 80 2 Halts or rollbacks, last 5 years measured 100 0 Years in production measured 89 9 years Tech & development 12% of score 91
Monthly active core developers measured 64 18 Open source assessed 100 Fully open Originality assessed 100 Novel design or research Programmability assessed 100 Full smart contracts (EVM or native VM) Security budget 10% of score 54
Fee share of security rewards assessed 15 Under 3% Real reward to securers assessed 50 Roughly break-even Security spend (rewards ÷ market cap per year) assessed 100 1.5% or more of market cap per year Security trend (hashrate or staked share, 1 year) assessed 50 Flat Annual fees ÷ market cap measured 26 0.0059% Daily active addresses measured ?
Unknown TVL or non-speculative settlement ÷ market cap measured ?
Unknown
Shitcoin score breakdown Higher is worse · total 19 Admin powers 15% of score 17
Freeze or blacklist function measured 0 No Mint authority measured 0 None Upgrade path measured 50 Admin upgrade with ≥ 7-day timelock Market cap ÷ annual economic throughput measured ?
Unknown Function beyond speculation assessed 0 Money, gas or collateral Token needed to use the product assessed 0 Required Hype dependence 10% of score 0
Social mentions ÷ active addresses measured ?
Unknown Trading turnover measured ?
Unknown Celebrity, influencer or politician launch assessed 0 No Track record 10% of score 0
Core-protocol exploits with user losses, last 5 years measured 0 0 Regulatory enforcement against the issuer measured 0 None Insider control 20% of score 30
Team, investor and foundation holdings measured 20 ~10% (est.) Top-10 wallets' share measured ?
Unknown Who controls upgrades and governance assessed 40 Foundation-led Unlock overhang 15% of score 2
FDV ÷ market cap measured 3 1.2× Unlocks in next 12 months measured 0 0% Methodology v0.8 · computed 2026-09-29 