AlphaGrowth Details What Cardano Needs to Attract Major Market Makers

AlphaGrowth has outlined the infrastructure Cardano DeFi would need to become more attractive to large market makers and professional liquidity providers. Speaking on Cardano Over Coffee on September 10 during its first public PRIME update, the team connected those requirements to its ongoing assessment of gaps between Cardano and more developed DeFi markets.

Higher TVL Alone Will Not Solve the Market Maker Gap

The discussion began with a question about whether Cardano could attract market makers such as Jump Crypto, Wintermute and Amber Group, which operate across major digital asset markets.

AlphaGrowth said firms at that level look beyond total value locked when deciding where to deploy capital. They require deep liquidity, strong composability between protocols, trusted testing frameworks, wallet security and markets where large positions can be entered, managed and exited efficiently.

Lending markets were highlighted as one requirement. Professional participants need confidence in collateral systems, liquidation rails and the ability to move capital efficiently in and out of positions.

AlphaGrowth said Cardano's current infrastructure would still need improvement even under a scenario with substantially higher TVL. The team specifically linked market maker participation to infrastructure that can support strategies already used across other markets.

Bridging and Capital Access Remain Part of the Cardano DeFi Gap

Better bridging and more efficient on-ramp and off-ramp infrastructure were also identified as areas that could improve access to Cardano markets.

These systems become particularly relevant when market makers operate strategies across centralized exchanges, traditional financial markets and multiple DeFi ecosystems at the same time.

During the discussion, AlphaGrowth referenced strategies involving perpetual futures, funding rate arbitrage and DeFi yield. For Cardano to participate more deeply in those strategies, capital needs efficient routes between markets, while lending and liquidation systems need to fit into the same operating framework.

Wallet distribution and agent-native infrastructure were discussed separately as part of PRIME's broader work on bringing more users and businesses into Cardano applications. AlphaGrowth has been examining both cross-chain access and infrastructure designed for emerging agentic payment use cases.

PRIME Connects Cardano Builders With Institutional Requirements

AlphaGrowth said its work has included discussions with Cardano-native developers as well as teams from EVM and other blockchain environments.

Feedback from external teams indicates that Cardano's architecture is sufficiently different to make some migrations expensive and time-consuming.

AlphaGrowth said the current development pipeline therefore has strong Cardano-native representation, with teams already familiar with the network's transaction model and infrastructure.

The same coordination challenge applies to liquidity providers. Market makers need infrastructure they can trust before committing substantial capital, while deeper liquidity gives protocols and professional strategies more room to operate.

PRIME is addressing both sides by working with builders on infrastructure requirements while discussing those requirements with potential external partners and capital providers.

Cardano's path to large market makers is therefore not one headline partnership. It depends on whether lending markets, liquidation systems, bridges, wallets and capital rails can fit into the same operating playbook those firms already use across other markets.