Cardano to Introduce Smart Contract Functionality...ADA Primed Up for New ATH

Cardano's native token ADA is enjoying a nice pump as the platform's chief developer announced release date of much anticipated 'Alonzo Upgrade'. Alonzo Upgrade will go live on September 12 via a hard fork combinator (HFC) event. At moment of writing ADA is trading at $2.11, a 16% rise in 24 hrs.

Alonzo Upgrade will bring smart contract functionality to Cardano. Smart contract functionality will allow Cardano to include the applications like Decentralized Finance(Defi) which allows financial services like automated lending and trading.

Cardano lack of smart contracts has been criticized by many, as the blockchain aims to pitch itself as Ethereum challenger. Ethereum is leading the blockchain world when it comes to smart contract applications.

It seems with upcoming Alonzo Upgrade, Cardano is on right track. But it still have to go a long way ahead, in order to have any chance of competing with already established smart contracts centered platforms like Ethereum or Binance Smart Chain.

Nevertheless, market is responding positively to the news of Cardano incorporating Smart Contract functionality. ADA reached $2.28 yesterday highest since mid May all time high of $2.31, pushing market cap to $68 billion at 3rd position replacing BNB.

5$ ADA isn't utterly out of the question as the momentum is behind ADA. If every thing goes as per plan and defi expansion starts happening, prices can soar pretty quickly.