Fireblocks Plans Cardano Native Token Support by March 2027

Cardano Foundation and Fireblocks announced on September 24 that Cardano Native Tokens will receive full support on the institutional digital asset platform. The planned integration addresses a gap between assets issued on Cardano and the custody infrastructure used by financial institutions.

Fireblocks Extends Support Beyond ADA

Fireblocks provides businesses with infrastructure for securing digital assets and authorizing transactions. According to the joint announcement, its customers include thousands of banks, exchanges, payment firms and fintech companies.

The platform has supported ADA since 2021. Handling other Cardano tokens, however, has required additional manual steps. Native support will make those tokens standard assets within Fireblocks, allowing customers to hold, send and receive them through established workflows.

Those workflows include transaction policies based on the asset, amount, source and destination. Organizations can allow or block transfers and require additional approvals according to their internal rules.

What Changes for Cardano Token Issuers

Cardano native tokens are built into the blockchain’s ledger, which tracks their ownership and movement without requiring separate smart contracts for basic token accounting. That network-level support still requires integration by the platforms institutions use to manage their assets.

For stablecoin and tokenized asset issuers, the Fireblocks announcement addresses that operational requirement. Financial counterparties using the platform would gain a standard way to handle Cardano-issued assets within their existing custody systems.

Cardano Foundation CEO Frederik Gregaard identified access to established infrastructure as a practical barrier to institutional adoption.

“Institutions rarely adopt a new asset on its own. Adoption happens through trusted infrastructure,” Gregaard said.

The planned expansion therefore extends institutional access beyond Cardano’s base currency to assets created by issuers across its ecosystem.

Token Standards and the March 2027 Rollout

The announced scope includes tokens using the Cardano Token Registry, associated with CIP-26, and the onchain metadata standard CIP-68.

CIP-26 connects blockchain identifiers with readable information stored offchain, such as token names and descriptions. CIP-68 stores metadata onchain through a reference-token structure and supports both fungible tokens and NFTs. Covering both accommodates different metadata approaches already used by Cardano projects.

Support is expected to become available by March 2027. Fireblocks and Cardano Foundation also plan to define the scope of further DeFi and ecosystem integrations during 2027.

The confirmed implementation target is native token custody and transfers under Fireblocks’ existing security and policy controls. The scope of additional DeFi integrations will be determined through that planned work.