Cardano Lines Up An $80 Million War Chest: DDC Fund Goes Live

The Cardano Foundation is backing an on-chain “info action” that would route up to $75 million from Cardano’s treasury into a new, Draper Dragon-managed ecosystem fund targeting a total $80 million raise, with a mandate to invest in Cardano-native startups while sending proceeds back to the treasury over time.

If approved, the vehicle, dubbed the Cardano x Draper Dragon Ecosystem Fund (the “DDC Fund”), would run for at least six years, deploy venture-style capital across early-stage teams and ecosystem growth programs, and report performance via a public dashboard and quarterly disclosures, the Foundation said in a forum post published roughly a day before the announcement.

Cardano Moves To Turn Its Treasury Into A VC Engine

The proposal is designed as a budget info action that would authorize three treasury withdrawal tranches over 438 epochs: a fixed $15 million first tranche, followed by two tranches targeting $30 million each in years two and four. The withdrawals are denominated in ADA and capped at 175 million ADA in aggregate, with per-tranche caps of 50 million ADA for the first and 85 million ADA for the second and third.

The remaining $5 million to reach the $80 million headline size is expected to come from qualified external limited partners (eLPs), a structure the post frames as both incremental capital and a way to “prov[e] the value proposition of Cardano investments to a larger audience.”

Cardano’s pitch is that the fund turns the treasury from a passive pool into a compounding capital vehicle. “The goals of this proposal are straightforward and ambitious: Deliver a return multiple back to the Treasury; make Cardano self-sustaining while increasing the ecosystem’s total value locked (‘TVL’), on-chain activity, and developer participation; and transform the Treasury from a passive reserve into an active growth engine that compounds Cardano ecosystem value,” the post said.

Under the proposed structure, Draper Dragon acts as general partner and controls investment decisions. An affiliate adviser, described as an “exempt reporting adviser regulated by the Securities Exchange Commission”, would provide due diligence and advisory support. The Cardano Foundation positions itself as an enabler rather than an investment decision-maker, taking responsibility for orchestrating the legal setup and administering the proposal under the Cardano constitution.

To route economics back to the treasury, the plan creates a Cayman Islands special purpose vehicle (SPV) that would serve as the fund’s limited partner on behalf of the treasury. The SPV is described as “ownerless” and intended to exist solely for the economic benefit of the treasury, with an initial three-director setup that includes an independent director, a Foundation director, and a community-elected “Community SPV Director.”

Targets Of The DCC Fund

The DDC Fund’s financial targets are framed in institutional VC terms: a roughly 3x gross multiple on invested capital and a 25%+ IRR, benchmarked against institutional blockchain and crypto venture funds, with the post stressing projections are illustrative and not performance guarantees.

On the ecosystem side, the ambition is explicit: contribute to increasing Cardano TVL from “the current $300M to $3B+,” split between $1.5B+ in RWA and $1.5B+ in DeFi, while also pushing higher on-chain usage, network revenue, and developer participation.

The treasury-funded $75 million would be allocated across direct investments, growth capital, and educational support, plus fund and administration costs. Direct investments are slated to take the largest share ($50 million), while growth capital ($11.5 million) and educational support ($6 million) fund marketing, liquidity initiatives, exchange introductions, and Draper University programming such as accelerators and hacker houses.

Because withdrawals are voted through governance over time, the plan bakes in a 20% buffer for ADA price fluctuations, and allows the GP discretion to time conversions to USD or stablecoins and to defer capital calls for up to six months. Excess value from a rising ADA price is meant to reduce later tranches; shortfalls can be handled via the buffer, deferrals, top-up governance actions, or adjustments within the tranche and aggregate caps.

The post also outlines failure modes. If treasury withdrawals repeatedly fail, specifically, “at least three successive Treasury withdrawals fail to pass within a calendar year”, the GP may wind the fund down and liquidate assets in a controlled process.

Transparency is promised via a public KPI dashboard and quarterly fund reports, plus AMAs and roundtables, but with a clear boundary: deal terms, valuations, and certain portfolio information would remain confidential, consistent with “standard” venture fund practice.

At press time, ADA traded at $0.4215.