Withdraw ₳700,000 for ZK Bridge administered by Intersect
175 DReps voted · 52 with a rationale
Open a row to read the rationale.
- Yes 12.2M ₳ Rationale
Disclaimer: This is a general rationale we have prepared to support our “yes” vote on all the 39 treasury withdrawal actions. This follows careful review and consideration of the metadata of these treasury withdrawal proposals and hence is not a blanket voting practice.
We, the Wada DRep Committee, have decided to upvote on all 39 Treasury Withdrawal governance actions currently live on-chain and submitted under the administration of IntersectMBO. These actions are the necessary implementation step following the community's approval of the ₳275.3 million Cardano Ecosystem Budget, the necessary budget info action that precedes the treasury withdrawal process. Our support reflects not only continuity with our earlier "yes" votes on the overarching budget info action and its constituent proposals but also our confidence in the smart contract guide and project execution mechanisms Intersect has established as an administrative body for these proposals.
Each of these 39 withdrawals corresponds directly to proposals that have already passed a respective Budget Info Action with wide community and DRep support of 64.23%. As Wada DRep, we reviewed, scored, and supported many of these initiatives during the budgeting phase, using our internal ₳280M Net Change Limit framework. Our endorsement of the full ₳275.3M package was not a blanket approval but the outcome of detailed deliberation. Therefore, we see it as our responsibility to honor those community-approved funding decisions by affirming these follow-up Treasury withdrawal governance actions.
Importantly, we are confident in Intersect’s role as the administrator of these treasury disbursements. We have independently reviewed the Smart Contract Guide, disbursement architecture, and accountability structures associated with these withdrawals. The use of milestone-gated smart contracts, multi-signature treasuries, and on-chain/off-chain tracking mechanisms provides strong assurance of transparency, risk management, and community accountability. We are particularly satisfied that Intersect has adopted security-audited contract templates and provides public documentation on how treasury funds will be administered, paused if necessary, and even returned if unused.
In our view, rejecting or abstaining from these Treasury Withdrawals at this stage would risk destabilizing delivery timelines, undermining community trust, and introducing administrative conflicts that may violate the spirit of the Constitution’s Articles on budgeting. We believe that treasury funding is not just about allocation; it’s about consistent and credible execution. As such, the DRep role requires continuity and follow-through, especially when prior voting outcomes have clearly mandated action.
Therefore, in alignment with our constitutional responsibilities, community-aligned decision-making, and our assessment of Intersect’s administrative protocols, we have decided to upvote on all 39 Treasury Withdrawals Governance Actions.
- Yes 11M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 10.8M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 8.8M ₳ Rationale
「275M ADA Administered by Intersect」に含まれるすべての個別提案に対して、エクレシア投票の段階では必ずしもすべてに賛成していたわけではありませんが、最終的には本ガバナンスアクションに賛成票を投じました。Cardanoエコシステム全体への貢献を高く評価し、その前進を後押しする立場から、今回提出された39件すべての提案に賛成票を投じる判断をいたしました。\n\nWhile I did not necessarily support every individual proposal included in "275M ADA Administered by Intersect" during the Ekklesia vote, I ultimately voted Yes on this governance action. Recognizing its overall contribution to the Cardano ecosystem and in support of continued progress, I cast a Yes vote on all 39 proposals submitted under this initiative.
- Yes 8.1M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 7.8M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 7.3M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 7.1M ₳ Rationale
I voted ABSTAIN on this proposal in Ekklesia, but thanks to Intersect's decision to unbundle the single treasury withdrawal action into multiple ones, I have had some more room to reconsider some of my original decisions.
I want to be frank (and I may make a mistake) - the fact that ENCOINS V1 was not a successful product at the level that I expected it could be - was a factor that did influence my original NO vote. If I am correct Eryx are active contributors to the ENCOINS protocol, currently deployed on the Cardano mainnet
The perceived low usability of the ENCOINS V1 product did influence my decision towards this proposal (for what its worth) during the Ekklesia vote - as it just did not bode well for me. Yes, these are completely different initiatives - but I was not able to ignore information that I had.
In the meantime, several things have changed. I have early tested ENCOINS V2 on PreProd and found it to be much much more intuitive and straightforward to use. I essentially do support the effort to building a ZK bridge for Cardano.
I think there is room for a change of my vote to a YES. - Yes 6.2M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 6M ₳ Rationale
Voting decision was made to be consistent with my reconciliation back in May 2025;
https://2025budget.intersectmbo.org/voters/drep1yfdfs28uwafjgmrkatdektlzrvha2cmvqjhuz700e04mawq23rmrgReady to move forward overall with the budgeting process and look forward to a smoother process next year. I voted for a lower NCL overall (200M), however found in supporting things that we really ought to have funded to keep momentum in development and enhancements on-chain (supporting both open and non-open-sourced projects) I came a bit higher than that (250M+).
We will need to strike a balance in treasury withdrawels for projects that push development forward (and therefore the chains efficiency, performance, resiliancy, and seucrity) -- and businsess that wish to participate, of any size, and extend the capabilities and real-world use cases of Cardano.
My votes, I hope, align with my overall goal as a DRep to see continuous improvement in the ecosystem. https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Tarrant64/mr_cata_gov/refs/heads/main/mr_cata_gov%20.txt
- Yes 5.5M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 5.3M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 5.3M ₳ Rationale
A ZK bridge framework positions Cardano to interact credibly with external ecosystems while laying the groundwork for future zkRollup infrastructure.
The technical scope is ambitious but justified, and the vendor (Eryx) brings strong ZK expertise with relevant contributions in both the Cardano and Ethereum ecosystems. This aligns with STORM Partners’ mission to support high-leverage infrastructure that attracts capital, talent, and developer adoption while expanding Cardano’s narrative as a privacy and security-first chain. - Yes 4.8M ₳ Rationale
Though the proposal is vague on justifying the competency of the devs behind this implementation, open source ZK smart contract will provide a foundation for future bridge implementations.
Though the proposal is vague on justifying the competency of the devs behind this implementation, open source ZK smart contract will provide a foundation for future bridge implementations.
- Yes 4.8M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 4.6M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 4.5M ₳ No rationale
- No 4.4M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 4.2M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 4.2M ₳ Rationale
I vote YES because core engineering is the priority of my DRep account.
Strength and honor.
- Yes 4M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 3.8M ₳ Rationale
Voting Rationale for 2025-08 Treasury Withdrawals
The following outlines the general lenses and beliefs that guided my voting decisions on the 39 withdrawal proposals submitted under Cardano’s Voltaire governance. I am reusing this rationale for proposals that aligned with these principles and did not require additional explanation due to unique mitigating concerns.
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Cardano: State of Play
The vision of the Cardano ecosystem—to create a fairer financial system, less subject to the whims of individuals, elites, nations, or cultures—remains worthy of support. In general, we are progressing toward that goal.
The bedrock tenet of any blockchain is trustworthiness. While Cardano’s base layer and transaction integrity are mature, the ecosystem has not yet reached the scale needed to fulfill its mission. Infrastructure that supports scaling—especially when open-sourced—should be prioritized for funding.
Because the ecosystem currently allows for anonymity and lacks effective mechanisms to penalize bad actors, it is vulnerable to abuse. Public funding is at risk from fraud, budget inflation, frivolous proposals, and well-intentioned but economically unviable ideas. Given that grift is currently viable, all funding requests must be critically reviewed—with a strong default bias toward skepticism.
However, in any new system, failure and error are expected. The many problems we’ve seen in this first funding cycle are normal and should be treated as feedback to help us improve, not as reasons to disengage.
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Fiscal Philosophy
I view the Cardano treasury as a sovereign wealth fund—a public resource meant to grow over the long term. Spending should be closely aligned with income.
Most projects should ultimately sustain themselves by generating revenue commensurate with their value. But Cardano is still an immature economic system, and many valuable contributions will require public funding at this stage—analogous to early government support for foundational infrastructure.
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Approach to the Budget Process
This first Voltaire budget cycle has experienced serious growing pains. I do not believe that builders should be asked to shoulder the full financial risk of an immature, unclear, and delayed funding process.
Many proposers have worked through most of 2025 without knowing whether their funding would come through. This has impaired their ability to allocate resources intelligently.
I believe the greater ecosystem risk lies in failing to fund projects that were already approved by the community—under the reasonable assumption that funding would follow—than in inadvertently funding a few proposals that should have been rejected. Accordingly, I adopted a bias toward optimism and benefit of the doubt.
However, in cases where proposals appeared excessively extractive, failed to demonstrate economic value in line with their requests, or raised too many concern flags, I voted “no” despite that bias.
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Bias Toward Core Infrastructure and Open-Source
Cardano is first and foremost an infrastructure system. Public funding is best directed toward foundational layers and tooling, rather than toward products that should be able to find product-market fit and attract users or investors.
Public money should come with public return—either in the form of open-sourced outputs or equity-like participation in future value creation.
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Additional Beliefs and Disclosures
I believe in the wisdom of crowds. My votes are based on independent reading of the proposals, personal communications with teams, and my own biases and interpretations. I assume some of my conclusions are incorrect—but trust that the collective judgment of voters will yield a generally sound outcome despite individual errors.
I voted in good faith and without compensation. I have no proposals of my own and no financial interest in any proposal beyond that of any other ADA holder.
- Yes 3.7M ₳ Rationale
I endorse all proposals incorporating zero-knowledge solutions and technologies.
- Yes 3.7M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 3.5M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 3M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 2.8M ₳ Rationale
I am following through with my YES vote from the Cardano Budget 2025 Ekklesia process. This proposal falls within my personal NCL of 250,000,000 ADA.
- Yes 2.7M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 2.7M ₳ Rationale
A couple of months ago, I supported the resolution to bundle all of the Intersect Budget Proposals into 1 or 2 formal on-chain governance votes.
Each of these proposals has already received 50% or greater support from the active DReps in the ecosystem, and I will honor that prior decision.
A couple of months ago, I supported the resolution to bundle all of the Intersect Budget Proposals into 1 or 2 formal on-chain governance votes.
Each of these proposals has already undergone extensive scrutiny and received 50% or greater support from the active DReps in the ecosystem, and I will honor that prior decision and the work these prospective developers have put in by voting yes on all the proposals from the Intersect Budget team.
- Yes 2.6M ₳ Rationale
This seems like a meaningful contribution to the ecosystem — if it’s made open. I’m not sure it should cost this much, but in the long term, it does appear to be valuable.
- Yes 2.5M ₳ No rationale
- No 2.5M ₳ Rationale
The last thing we need is some bridge exploit. I might think differently about this in the 2026 budget but for right now I am focused on minimum viable governance + important ecosystem efforts. Bridging out doesnt make my budget cut unfortunately though I love the technology.
- Yes 2.5M ₳ Rationale
ZK技術を活用した信頼性の高いブリッジ構築は、Cardanoの相互運用性を飛躍的に向上させる重要提案です。中央集権的な多署名方式に依存せず、テストネット上での具体的実装と文書化が約束されており、コストも抑えられているため、賛成します。
A zk-based bridge significantly strengthens Cardano’s cross-chain interoperability by removing trust assumptions common in multisig bridges. With a planned testnet deployment, full documentation, and low budget, I vote in favor of this technically sound and strategically aligned proposal.
- Yes 2.5M ₳ Rationale
ZK is very important. Adding Aiken support makes sense. Open source as well.
- Yes 2.4M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 2.1M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 2.1M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.9M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.9M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.8M ₳ Rationale
I am voting yes on this proposal as it enhances Cardano’s interoperability, supporting developers and users, and increasing liquidity.
- No 1.8M ₳ Rationale
I am voting No on the proposal to withdraw ₳700,000 from the Cardano Treasury to fund a ZK bridge administered by Intersect. While the development of zero-knowledge interoperability is conceptually aligned with Cardano’s long-term goals, this proposal appears premature and potentially duplicative of ongoing efforts by Input Output Global (IOG). Without clear differentiation or coordination with IOG’s roadmap, this initiative risks fragmentation and wasteful overlap. Furthermore, the proposal does not establish a compelling or time-sensitive justification for immediate funding, nor does it outline transparent governance, execution milestones, or long-term maintenance plans. Given the Treasury’s finite lifespan, large discretionary outlays must meet a high bar of strategic clarity and ecosystem consensus. I am not opposed to supporting a ZK bridge in the future, but it should follow a clearer demonstration of need, coordination, and timing. For now, this proposal does not warrant approval.
- Yes 1.7M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.7M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.4M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.4M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.2M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.2M ₳ Rationale
I decided to vote ✅ YES on 37 treasury withdrawals, ➖ ABSTAIN on none, and ❌ NO on 2 treasury withdrawals from the Intersect 2025 budget.
It’s obvious I consider all proposals I approved in the budget vote on Ekklesia beneficial for Cardano, so those all receive a ✅ YES vote.
I also vote ✅ YES for most proposals I initially abstained from or voted against in the Ekklesia vote. There are a few reasons for this:
- Some proposals gained strong community support after all, so I don’t want to be the one standing in the way, especially when the requested amount is negligible in the bigger picture.
- Some proposals I actually liked, but I found them more suitable for Catalyst. However, with all the delays, it now makes more sense to fund them as soon as possible.
- Some didn’t get my initial support because I thought the requested amount was too high. But I now believe it’s better for the ecosystem to fund them, despite the larger budget, than not fund them at all.
- I needed to vote for budget proposals with my own NCL in mind. Not all those I approved made it, however, so that leaves some room for other ones.
I won’t approve the treasury withdrawal for two proposals:
❌ Withdraw ₳3,000,000 for High-yield RWA Asset for Cardano: Tokenized Real Estate
This proposal won’t bring much value to our ecosystem, imho.❌ Withdraw ₳1,500,000 for Complement Catalyst: Extended Quadratic Funding---Zero Operational Costs
While the proposal includes some interesting ideas for a fairer voting mechanism, I now support Catalyst and don’t see the need for an additional funding system at this moment, especially considering total spending. The requested amount also seems too small to meaningfully fund multiple projects. While the model relies on donations, it’s unclear what the donor incentive is. Since voting power is tied to donation size, why wouldn’t donors just support specific fundraisers run directly by the projects they care about? That way, they can ensure their contribution goes straight to their preferred initiative without needing it to win a vote first.
I do appreciate the idea of a hybrid funding model where the treasury covers part of a project, but ideally, the remaining portion should come from investors rather than donations, imho.
Lastly, I don’t appreciate that the proposal’s title refers to Catalyst, even though it has no relationship to it. This seems intended to mislead people into thinking Catalyst would benefit from this proposal, which it doesn’t...I acknowledge there’s a metadata issue in the proposal “Withdraw ₳45,217 for MLabs Core Tool Maintenance & Enhancement: Cardano.nix”, but I approved it nonetheless, as the problem is minor and not worth obstructing the process.
- Yes 1.1M ₳ No rationale
- Yes 1.1M ₳ No rationale
- No 1M ₳ Rationale
In a landscape where Cardano must adopt a business-minded, strategic approach to safeguard its treasury and scientific foundation, this proposal feels premature and insufficiently grounded. The ecosystem would benefit more from incremental, well-scoped interoperability projects that leverage existing Layer 2 and ZK research, rather than a large upfront bet on an unproven ZK bridge framework.
The proposal’s abstract and motivation are heavy on buzzwords—“zero-knowledge,” “modular,” “trustless,” “isomorphic blockchains”—yet conspicuously light on concrete technical differentiation or demonstrable competitive advantage. Cardano’s existing ecosystem is already advancing with Hydra, optimistic rollups, and ongoing research in ZK proofs. What exactly sets this implementation apart? The rationale claims superiority over optimistic bridges by touting reduced latency and trust assumptions, but fails to engage with the inherent complexity and security challenges of ZK bridges, especially in a multi-chain environment. The devil is in the details, and those are missing here.
Furthermore, the vendor’s profile, while impressive in academic credentials and prior cryptographic work, lacks specific evidence of delivering production-grade cross-chain ZK bridge infrastructure. Contributions to libraries and protocols are not synonymous with having built a secure, scalable, and battle-tested bridge compatible with Cardano’s unique eUTxO model. The proposal does not clarify how the ZK circuits will interact with Cardano’s accounting model or how they will handle the notoriously difficult problem of finality and state synchronization in a trust-minimized way.
This is a "No" from my side!