Cardano (ADA) Redemption Controversy Over? | Crypto News
Following the controversial accusations, the outcomes of the third-party forensic review of the Cardano (ADA) voucher redemption program have been made public. Cardano’s founder, Charles Hoskinson, says he’s now “waiting for the apologies to come rolling in.”
Cardano Accusations Have ‘No Basis’
On Wednesday, the Cardano neighborhood celebrated after the third-party forensic review of the ADA voucher redemption program was printed. The investigative report, carried out by law firm McDermott Will & Schulte and the audit firm BDO, decided that the allegations against Input Output Global (IOG) don’t have any basis.
“After review of tens of thousands of documents, a forensic on-chain and traditional forensic analysis, and eighteen formal interviews of current employees, former employees, Voucher Holders, service providers, community members, and other third parties, the Investigation determined that each of the allegations related to the Topics of Investigation do not have any basis,” the report reads.
Public accusations included 5 main allegations, including that insiders stole or misused ADA that ought to have been allotted to voucher holders and that there have been improper sale ways associated to the voucher program.
The claims also accused Cardano blockchain upgrades of being designed to make voucher redemption troublesome, and deleted voucher holders’ “private keys” or property. Lastly, the allegation that Cardano insiders had no legal proper to ship unredeemed ADA to CDH and resolve how to spend it.
The controversy emerged in May, when Non-Fungible Token (NFT) artist Masato Alexander alleged that Charles Hoskinson had “unilaterally used his genesis keys to REWRITE the Cardano ledger” during the Allegra onerous fork in 2021 to take control of 318-350 million ADA, about 0.2 p.c of the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) allocation that remained unclaimed years after launch.
Hoskinson denied Alexander’s claims, arguing that 99.8% of the vouchers bought have been redeemed by their unique patrons, while the remaining 0.2% have been “returned to the TGE and donated to Intersect through the same process that funded the Cardano Foundation.”
The Review Findings
Based on the Investigation, McDermott Will & Schulte and BDO discovered that the sources of the public allegations against IOG and Charles Hoskinson didn’t originate from unredeemed voucher holders, and they “did not identify evidence indicating that Input Output or Sawyers turned away any potential Voucher Holder who possessed a valid Voucher.”
Additionally, they concluded that cheap guardrails have been applied to stop misleading advertising and marketing and gross sales ways, noting that this system was not designed to exploit the aged.
The audit also revealed that 97.3% of all the vouchers, or 98.8% of the ADA allotted, have been redeemed on-chain during the Byron period, and “substantial efforts were undertaken to cause Voucher Holders to redeem on-chain” at the time.
As of August 15, 2025, 99.2% of Vouchers consisting of 99.7% of all ada bought pursuant to the Voucher Program have been redeemed through the on-chain redemptions and Post-Sweep Redemption Project.
Meanwhile, the review highlighted that the voucher certificates contained redemption codes instead of “private keys,” refuting the accusation that these keys have been later deleted. It also concluded that Cardano insiders didn’t misappropriate the staking rewards from the unredeemed ADA.
Time To Move On, Says Hoskinson
Hoskinson went on X Space to share the audit outcome, studying the announcement of IOG’s Chief Legal Officer & Chief Policy Officer, Joel Telpner, and the chief abstract of the 128-page doc.
Cardano’s founder said that it’s been a “deeply frustrating” course of, noting that “It’s one thing to attack my intelligence, my physical appearance, my business acumen, my integrity. It’s another thing to accuse me of a crime.”
“This is over. And for the people who stirred this pot: do the right thing, and just apologize. Have some common fucking decency as a human being. Apologize. Let’s just all move on, say you were wrong. Have enough integrity to do that,” he requested.
Hoskinson shared his hope that most people will understand that the accusations have been taken “too far,” concluding that “Hopefully, we can now just put this nightmare behind us.”
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