Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson highlights an neglected potential in Bitcoin and XRP DeFi throughout a Token2049 interview.
On the convention in Singapore, Hoskinson spoke with Crypto Banter host Ran Neuner about Cardano’s future, challenges in DeFi, and the untapped alternative in XRP DeFi.
He acknowledged that Cardano has fallen behind rivals like Solana within the DeFi race, noting that Cardano’s complete worth locked (TVL) stays below $1 billion and that stablecoin adoption has been weak. Nonetheless, he emphasised that the market doesn’t worth initiatives primarily based solely on DeFi metrics.
Cardano Founder Identifies XRP $100 Billion DeFi Vacuum
Hoskinson described XRP as a sleeping large within the DeFi area. Particularly, he identified that the asset has over $100 billion in valuation however little to no native yield-generating infrastructure.
“There’s virtually $100 billion price of XRP floating round that’s yield-free. There’s no DeFi ecosystem for it,” Hoskinson stated.
He recommended that pairing XRP with real-world belongings (RWAs) and yield-generating merchandise might appeal to a good portion of that capital into the DeFi ecosystem.
The Cardano founder believes that with correct infrastructure, DeFi on XRP might turn into a multibillion-dollar ecosystem. Notably, platforms like Flare have begun providing yield alternatives for XRP holders.
Bitcoin DeFi and the UTXO Benefit
Hoskinson additionally sees huge potential in Bitcoin DeFi, one other space he says is vastly undervalued regardless of Bitcoin’s $2.4 trillion market cap. In his phrases:
“We even have an enormous native benefit for Bitcoin DeFi as a result of we’re UTXO and Bitcoin is UTXO. You’ll be able to write Cardano good contracts that compile and run on Bitcoin.”
He argued that this interoperability might give Cardano an edge in unlocking dormant worth throughout each the Bitcoin and XRP networks.
Cardano Founder Charles Hoskinson on the chance in Bitcoin & XRP DeFi 📈
“Bitcoin DeFi I believe is the largest play. Cardano’s UTxO lets good contracts compile and run on Bitcoin.”
“For XRP DeFi, there’s additionally enormous untapped alternative.”@IOHK_Charles on @crypto_banter pic.twitter.com/2jZkys8mjv
— Cardanians (CRDN) (@Cardanians_io) October 7, 2025
Midnight, Scaling, and What’s Subsequent for Cardano
Moreover, Hoskinson shared updates on Midnight, Cardano’s information protection-focused sidechain. He famous that Midnight has already attracted over 100 partnerships and integrations, together with Courageous, Blockchain.com, and Bitcoin.com.
He additionally highlighted Hydra, a layer-2 scaling answer able to processing as much as 1,000,000 transactions per second. In the meantime, he emphasised the necessity for quicker productization.
With Cardano’s on-chain treasury governance now energetic and $1.5 billion obtainable for group use, Hoskinson stated the venture is coming into a brand new period of decentralized growth.
“The group simply authorised the primary price range. We nonetheless have over 200 engineers working in and across the Cardano ecosystem,” he stated.
Primarily, whereas Cardano missed the final DeFi wave, Hoskinson is now specializing in the untapped potential in Bitcoin and XRP DeFi. These two networks have vital capital however little yield infrastructure.
