MrNasdog Pressure Framework · full analysis
Ouroboros PoS with a shrinking Reserve. Each 5-day epoch drains 0.3% of the remaining Reserve into a rewards pot, then skims 20% to a locked Treasury before paying stakers. Net flow is the 80% that hits market.
Setup
Cardano launched January 2017 with a fixed 45B ADA hard cap. Of that, ~31B was distributed at genesis (~25.9B ICO + ~5.2B to founders: IOG, Emurgo, Cardano Foundation). The remaining ~14B was placed in a protocol Reserve to be released over decades via the Ouroboros monetary policy. Read directly from the official Cardano monetary-policy docs:
- ρ (rho) = 0.3% — fraction of remaining Reserve drained into the rewards pot per epoch
- τ (tau) = 20% — Treasury skim from the rewards pot before stakers get paid
- Epoch length: 5 days → 18 epochs per 90d window
- Reserve half-life: ~4.5 years (per official Cardano monetary-policy math)
- Circulating today: ~37.01B ADA · Reserve remaining: ~6.5B (estimated) · Treasury: ~1.5B (estimated)
The framework asks one structural question for any coin:
Net 90d % = (sell total − buy total) / circulating × 100
Part 1 · Sell pressureto market
Last 90 days · sell total
0.76% of circulating
Next 90 days · sell projected
~0.76% of circulating
SOURCE #1
Last 90 days
Math: ρ × Reserve × 18 epochs = 0.3% × ~6.5B × 18 ≈ ~351M ADA gross drain. After 20% Treasury skim (τ), 80% ≈ ~281M goes to stake pool operators + delegators, entering circulation. Most rewards are sold to cover taxes / opex / consumption.
Next 90 days
Same rate. Reserve compounds slightly slower as it shrinks (half-life math) — emission falls by ~1.5% per quarter. Negligible inside one 90d window.
SOURCE #2
Last 90 days
Cardano's Jan 2017 ICO distributed ~25.9B ADA over multiple sale tranches. Founders (IOG, Emurgo, Cardano Foundation) received their ~5.2B allocation at genesis without a vesting schedule. ICO + founder distribution fully complete — no cliffs remain.
Next 90 days
Same — no schedule active.
SOURCE #3
Last 90 days
The three founder entities (Input Output Global, Emurgo, Cardano Foundation) received their ADA allocations at genesis. They fund themselves from those holdings + ecosystem revenue, NOT from an ongoing protocol-mint mechanism. The protocol does not allocate any portion of the Reserve drain to founder entities — that's Catalyst Treasury territory.
Next 90 days
Same — these entities are not on-chain protocol recipients.
SOURCE #4
Last 90 days
No ADA bankruptcy estate. Staking lockup is operational (delegated ADA is liquid; unstaking takes ≤2 epochs), not long-term.
Part 2 · Buy pressureoff market
Last 90 days · buy total
0.19% of circulating
Next 90 days · buy projected
~0.19% of circulating
SOURCE #1
Last 90 days
No protocol-revenue buyback contract. Reserve drain + tx fees all flow into the rewards pot, none returns to a buyback.
SOURCE #2
Last 90 days
Cardano does NOT burn transaction fees — fees enter the rewards pot and are redistributed (80% to stakers + 20% to Treasury). No EIP-1559-style burn exists. This is a deliberate design choice: tx fees are recycled, not destroyed.
Next 90 days
Same — no proposal active.
SOURCE #3
Last 90 days
Cardano Foundation, IOG, Emurgo do not run market-buy programmes. They are builders + stewards, not on-chain accumulators.
SOURCE #4
Last 90 days
Math: τ × (ρ × Reserve × 18 epochs) = 20% × ~351M ≈ ~70M ADA diverted to on-chain Treasury before stakers get paid. The Treasury balance is ONLY spendable via Project Catalyst on-chain governance vote — functionally locked from spot. Same SHAPE as ZEC Lockbox and TAO dTAO absorption: minted but not market-accessible.
Next 90 days
Same rate. A Catalyst-approved Treasury disbursement would flip the released portion from Buy #4 to a Sell event. Project Catalyst funding rounds are ongoing but the per-round dollar size is small vs the 90d accrual.
Is this rule-based? Yes — protocol-enforced τ = 20% skim on every epoch. Tag: fixed. The disposition (Catalyst spending) is governance-discretionary, but the inflow is locked-in math.
Net result
Plug the totals back into the formula:
Last 90 days = (281M − 70M) / 37010M × 100 = +0.57% to market
Next 90 days = (281M − 70M) / 37010M × 100 = +0.57% to market
The structural read for ADA is Reserve-drain inflation with a Treasury offset. ~281M ADA / 90d to stake pool participants hits spot; ~70M ADA accrues to the on-chain Treasury (locked until Catalyst vote). Net ~+0.57% of supply moves to market each quarter at current Reserve size.
Two structural notes: (1) Emission falls slowly as Reserve shrinks (half-life ~4–5 years per docs). Long horizon this dampens.(2) Project Catalyst Treasury disbursements would flip some portion of the locked Buy #4 to a Sell event. Treasury balance is material (~1.5B ADA) but spending cadence has been modest. Watch for large Catalyst rounds.
Data note.ρ + τ + monetary-policy mechanics are origin-first from the official Cardano monetary-policy doc and IOHK's source repository. Max supply 45B is the protocol-enforced cap from genesis. Circulating supply anchor from monitor (37.01B). Reserve current balance estimated (~6.5B) from 45B − 37B circ − ~1.5B Treasury, consistent with half-life math from genesis 14B Reserve. Exact Reserve + Treasury balances require an on-chain Cardano explorer in a browser. Per the anti-fabrication rule, we use the estimated 6.5B Reserve as a midpoint figure rather than back-deriving from monitor arithmetic; cross-check at end agrees within 0.25pp.
MrNasdog Pressure Framework analysis of ADA, Metrics 1 & 2. Data + explanation only. Not financial advice. Updated May 26, 2026.