Midnight Privacy Layer Launches With ₱12.13 billion ($200 million) Bet

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson launched Midnight, a privacy-focused blockchain, on Mar. 29 after putting up ₱12.13 billion ($200 million) of his own money. The network aims to fix Cardano's liquidity problem—just ₱8.13 billion ($134 million) locked in DeFi despite a ₱551.83 billion ($9.1 billion) market cap.

Google Cloud, Blockdaemon, MoneyGram, Pairpoint by Vodafone, eToro, Worldpay, and Bullish run the federated node model at launch. Hoskinson said the curated infrastructure lowers the trust bar for regulated institutions evaluating deployment, as they can verify who operates the network before committing sensitive workflows to it.

Cardano's developer count looks healthy—672 active developers according to Electric Capital—but daily chain fees tell a different story. The network generates less than $2,000 per day in fees, and stablecoins account for just ₱2.85 billion ($47 million). Monument Bank is piloting tokenized retail deposits worth ₱15.16 billion ($250 million) on Midnight, a fraction of the $7 billion in total deposits the bank manages for more than 100,000 customers. Worldpay is testing stablecoin payments using USDG, while Bullish builds proof-of-reserves tooling on the privacy layer.

Hoskinson framed Midnight as part of a generational blockchain arc: Satoshi gave sound money, Ethereum gave programmability, Cardano brought governance and interoperability, and Midnight returns identity and privacy. The network uses a dual-token model—NIGHT for governance and security, DUST for transaction costs—and a TypeScript-influenced smart contract language called Compact. Lace wallet support arrived in early March.

The Midnight Foundation set aside $30 million aimed at 2026 liquidity conversion. NIGHT token market cap hit above $1 billion in late January but fell to nearly $731 million by Mar. 30, according to CoinGecko. Midnight competes with Aztec, Namada, and Aleo in the privacy layer race. Aleo's 2025 Privacy Gap Report found that just 0.0013 percent of $1.22 trillion in institutional stablecoin volume settles on private rails. McKinsey projects tokenized financial assets will reach around $2 trillion by 2030, up from $26.67 billion tracked by RWA.xyz today.

Community-driven block production and broader decentralization are scheduled for later in 2026. Monument Bank will disclose issuance milestones over the next 90 days.