Some ADA HODLers out there logged back into their Daedalus wallets a few months ago at the height of the most recent bullrun only to find a nightmare scenario come to life: their investment is gone.

Byron-era buyers who stashed their ADA in the Daedalus wallet and were good HODLers have restored their wallets to find a balance of 0 ADA and no transaction history. It likely all started when Cardano moved from the testnet to the mainnet. Daedalus users found their install would no longer connect to the network, and they had to upgrade and restore their wallet.

Just check out this example from the Cardano forum:

And there is this Reddit thread with more of the same:

These are pretty serious accusations, but could it be that so many people are incorrectly entering their seed phrase? And if they are, are they actually restoring someone else’s empty wallet?

Unfortunately, I have my own experience with this issue. I wrote down and stored my Daedalus seed phrase. I did a test transfer of a small amount of ADA from Binance. I confirmed the money arrived, and then sent the remaining balance. Years later and after updating Daedalus, my balance is gone.

I’ve opened support tickets, I’ve waited patiently as IOHK asks me to wait for the ‘Import’ function to be implemented, I’ve tried again and again, and I still cannot access my modest amount of ADA.

All the while, I suffer through YouTube videos touting the ‘Cardano Summer,’ and hear about how it is taking marketshare from Ethereum, and the Alonzo hardfork will begin the implementation of smart contracts that will explode the price upward.

For those getting on the Cardano hype train, I cannot warn sternly enough against the Daedalus wallet. Atomic Wallet is a free download that supports Cardano and staking. But what about the Daedalus users who have lost significant amounts of ADA? Is this a storm brewing for the next big crypto?