“Copper has significant upside potential, with bullish scenarios projecting approximately 30% annual appreciation. At that rate, copper would appreciate 69% over 24 months, potentially more than covering the 49.4% break-even threshold. Of course, commodity prices can also decline,” Monty Metzger, Toto’s founder and chairman, told CoinDesk in an email.

“Toto takes no profit from this proposal,” Metzger added, attributing much of the additional spending to Cardano’s constitutional requirements for oversight and auditing.

The budget allocates 2.64 million ADA to Toto for technology and project management, plus a 441,732 ADA execution fee. Toto could also receive up to 278,291 ADA through a margin on third-party storage and insurance invoices, included within the operating budget. Together, those payments could reach about 3.36 million ADA, roughly 15% of the request.

What Toto gets

Toto would retain the platform’s commercial rights and income from its separately funded CuTT business. The treasury’s financial return would come from its copper sales and unused funds.

Metzger said the company wants to scale the product to “$5 billion in tokenized copper assets” and that “Cardano could become our flagship showcase.”

The tokens would first be minted on Ethereum and locked in a bridge, software that allows matching tokens to be issued on Cardano. The contracts and their security reviews remain future work. Metzger said trackers of tokenized real-world assets have “historically focused heavily on Ethereum-based assets.”