Cardano (ADA) at one point rose 12 percent to $0.27, hitting its highest level in five months.

On Oct. 5, blockchain media outlet U.Today reported that while bitcoin and ether moved sideways without major fluctuations, ADA posted its strongest upward run since May.

The sharp rise came as expectations for network expansion coincided with new service launches. The starting point for the move was RealFi, a real-world asset (RWA) tokenisation platform that went live on the mainnet on Oct. 1. Expectations for broader use of the Cardano ecosystem also grew as the USDr stablecoin was integrated into Lace, Liqwid and SundaeSwap.

What drew more market attention was a message from founder Charles Hoskinson. Hoskinson shared a 15-minute ADA/USDT chart showing the price jumping from about $0.244 to $0.264, adding only "#LeiosIsComing" to the post. The short phrase raised expectations for "Linear Leios", Cardano's next scalability upgrade.

Linear Leios is a throughput expansion technology based on the CIP-164 standard. The existing Ouroboros Praos chain maintains security and block order, while separately introducing larger endorser blocks to validate transactions in parallel. Stake pools validate transactions through BLS signatures, and validated transactions are recorded on the ledger in batches.

Cardano has been testing the technology on the Musashi Dojo network since June 2026. Under stable conditions, data processing speed increased sixfold, and results were presented showing potential improvements of 10-fold to 65-fold.

It was also confirmed that the rally was not entirely based on expanded real network usage. As the price approached around $0.264, short positions were liquidated, but trading volume on Cardano's decentralised exchanges (DEX) did not rise as much as the price. The daily momentum index climbed to 68.69 and a golden cross also appeared as the 50-day moving average rose above the 200-day moving average, but the strength of actual inflows was limited.

A key variable ahead is when the upgrade is actually implemented. Linear Leios integration is scheduled as part of the Dijkstra hard fork in late 2026. Under the plan, stake pool operators must manually register keys, and network throughput is set to rise step by step as system parameters are adjusted.

In the near term, $0.28 was cited as a nearby resistance level. For the ADA rise to continue, it will be watched whether expectations sparked by the RealFi launch and USDr integration translate into actual growth in ecosystem transactions, and whether the momentum from Hoskinson's "LeiosIsComing" lasts through the year-end integration schedule.