Cardano Founder: IOG's ADA holdings are for profit, not "gifts", different from the Cardano Foundation

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson defended blockchain research and engineering company Input Output Global (IOG) in a post on X, refuting criticisms of its ADA holdings and network adoption work.

Hoskinson clarified: "No ADA was 'given' to IOG, this is what we earned. This is not public funds, but the profits from building Cardano. The original value of IOG's ADA holdings was about $8 million in 2015. We have been building the ecosystem for nine years now. CF (Cardano Foundation) received ADA as a donation, they are obligated to use it for the ecosystem, that's the difference."

Hoskinson also said that CF missed an opportunity to integrate USDC with $3 million in 2021 when the foundation held assets worth nearly $2 billion.