USDKadena Blockchain Halts Operations After Five Years as KDA Price Collapses Over 65% and Exchanges Move to Delist
Team Cites Market Conditions Amid Sudden Shutdown; Blockchain to Continue Running Without Corporate Support
TL;DR:
- Kadena announced an immediate end to all business operations on October 21, 2025, citing market pressures.
- KDA’s crypto price plunged more than 65% within hours as exchanges OKX and Bybit began delisting the token.
- The blockchain remains functional through miners, but its future and coin market cap stability face uncertainty.
Kadena, once a rising contender among layer-1 blockchains, has abruptly shut down its core business operations after half a decade of development. The founding team confirmed on October 21, 2025, that it would “cease all business activity and active maintenance of the Kadena blockchain immediately,” citing harsh market conditions as the cause. While the company behind the network has folded, the Proof-of-Work blockchain itself will continue to run autonomously, maintained by miners and node operators who can still process transactions and validate blocks. The abrupt decision shocked the crypto price index across markets, sparking steep declines in the KDA token and sending ripple effects throughout the broader coin market cap landscape.
The collapse unfolded within hours of the announcement. KDA, Kadena’s native token, plunged more than 65% to around $0.072 after trading near $0.20 earlier in the day. Other reports estimated a drop exceeding 55% within hours, and roughly 60% in the first 90 minutes. The token, once worth $27.64 at its 2021 peak, has now lost over 99% of its value from that high. Kadena’s fall swiftly triggered reactionary measures from major exchanges: Bybit and OKX both announced plans to remove or suspend KDA trading. OKX will disable deposits immediately, halt spot trading by October 26, 2025, and discontinue withdrawals on January 22, 2026. Bybit will end its lending and borrowing programs for KDA and terminate perpetual contracts by October 24. These moves effectively freeze liquidity for holders, amplifying uncertainty over the token’s remaining market access.
While Kadena’s public network stays online, the end of its corporate operations marks a crucial shift. The platform’s emissions schedule remains intact, with 566 million KDA still to be mined through 2139 and roughly 83.7 million tokens due for release by November 2029. Without active development or business partnerships, the network faces a prolonged test of whether decentralized infrastructure alone can sustain value. The team encouraged miners and node operators to update to the latest binary release to ensure uninterrupted functionality, but with no central oversight, long-term support depends entirely on the community and existing validators.
Kadena was co-founded by former JPMorgan technologist Stuart Popejoy and former SEC technologist Will Martino. The project launched its mainnet in 2019 with ambitious plans to scale proof-of-work through its multi-chain “Chainweb” architecture and its smart-contract language Pact. The blockchain once commanded a near-$4 billion coin market cap during the height of the 2021 bull run, positioning itself as an enterprise-grade solution blending security and scalability. Yet despite its technical achievements, adoption struggled to match expectations. Analysts at CryptoSlate framed Kadena’s fall as a warning for the industry—proof that strong engineering cannot offset weak product-market fit. The outlet described it as part of a structural correction where many infrastructure-focused projects are collapsing after failing to attract real-world demand.
The announcement carried a tone of finality. “We are tremendously grateful to everybody who has participated in this journey with us,” the team wrote. “We regret that because of market conditions we are unable to continue to promote and support the adoption of this unique decentralized offering.” That statement underscored the harsh reality for smaller blockchain ventures in the current climate: as capital tightens and retail enthusiasm wanes, sustaining growth without institutional momentum becomes increasingly difficult.
Kadena’s demise has reignited discussion across crypto circles about decentralization’s limits. The case illustrates that while a blockchain may persist technically, its value network—developers, exchanges, investors, and users—can erode rapidly without institutional support. The combination of price collapse, delistings, and operational shutdown has left KDA’s future tied to community willpower and miner economics. For observers tracking the crypto price index and overall market health, the episode adds another cautionary data point to a maturing industry still sorting viable protocols from fading experiments.
This article has been refined and enhanced by ChatGPT.
