News linked to both this project and an event.
Odaily reports: The Zcash development team plans to activate the NU7 mainnet upgrade on November 5, after various organizations and engineering teams reached consensus on the upgrade content and expected timeline. Zcash developer Sean Bowe stated that the upgrade will activate on testnet on October 6.The team plans to evaluate NU7 testnet performance on October 20 before finalizing the mainnet upgrade and activation block height. The upgrade aims to reduce the target block interval from 75 seconds to 25 seconds, deprecate version 4 transactions, and integrate a network sustainability mechanism.The chosen network sustainability mechanism will preserve the Zcash halving cycle, with previously removed supply to be reintroduced starting February 2031. NU7 does not introduce new transaction formats and has limited impact on wallets, but full nodes, indexers, and block explorers may need adjustments. (Cointelegraph)
Bankless co-founder David Hoffman stated that ZEC primarily protects fund privacy through shielded transactions, while NEAR's privacy capabilities can extend to broader business activities. He views NEAR as a generalized version of ZEC's privacy concept.
Odaily News: The Zcash community has decided with 98.9% support to retain the Bitcoin-style halving mechanism, with a total of 2.4 million ZEC used in the vote, representing 66% of eligible tokens. The community also chose to shorten block times to 25 seconds, immediately deprecate the Sprout pool, and limit the scope of the NU7 upgrade to features that can be completed before September 30.ZEC briefly reached $1,388, rising 10.9% in a single day, with a market cap of $22.9 billion, climbing to ninth place among crypto assets by market capitalization. Zcash's Ironwood upgrade was activated in July, adding quantum-resistant transaction records; the token has risen over 2,500% in the past year. (Decrypt)
According to CoinDesk, approximately 2.4 million ZEC tokens participated in the privacy governance vote for Zcash's next major network upgrade, NU7, accounting for roughly two-thirds of the eligible supply. Of these, 99.9% supported reducing the block time from 75 seconds to 25 seconds, while 98.9% backed retaining the existing Bitcoin-style halving mechanism. Additionally, 99.3% favored deploying NU7 as soon as it is ready. The vote served solely to determine the direction of the upgrade; the associated features still require development, testing, and integration into the final release.
Odaily News: Approximately 2.4 million ZEC participated in the privacy-protection vote for Zcash's next major network upgrade, NU7, accounting for about two-thirds of the tokens eligible to vote.Voters supported shortening the block time to 25 seconds, retaining the Bitcoin-style halving schedule, and launching NU7 as soon as possible; they also supported postponing the reissuance of fees collected by the network sustainability mechanism until February 2031 and disabling transactions related to the deprecated Sprout privacy system. (CoinDesk)
Odaily News: Crypto asset management firm Grayscale estimates that Zcash mining rigs generate daily mining rewards roughly 2x those of Bitcoin mining rigs, and about 4x on a per-unit-of-electricity basis. Zcash mining activity has grown to more than 2.5x its level at the start of the year.Zach Pandl, head of research at Grayscale, said that at current valuations, Zcash mining profitability is relatively high, as token price gains have driven up mining rewards and encouraged more hash rate to join. Grayscale believes that more hash rate can support network security.The comparison uses the Bitmain S23 Hydro and Bitmain Z15 Pro as samples, assuming an electricity price of $0.05 per kilowatt-hour, full-load operation, and excluding transaction fees. Pool fees, cooling, other operating expenses, and equipment costs are not included in the calculation, and actual profitability is still affected by these factors.Bitcoin miners' total daily rewards are about $35 million, higher than Zcash's roughly $2 million. Grayscale's Zcash investment product assets under management surpassed $500 million on September 8 and recorded more than $70 million in cumulative external inflows. (Bitcoin.com News)
In a post, Cobo co-founder and CEO Shen Yu recalled that ZEC still casts a long shadow over him. When ZEC’s mainnet launched in 2016, BitMEX capped the price at 10 BTC, making it ZEC’s all-time high. He noted that shortly after he began mining on launch night, a transformer at his GPU mining farm was struck by lightning, and since that incident, ZEC has never appeared in his personal wallet again.
Odaily News - According to the official announcement, Gate has launched perpetual contract trading for STONK, BEN, and ZCAT, all supporting 1-10x leverage for both long and short positions, with trading bots and copy trading features simultaneously enabled.STONK is the platform token of StonkFun, a Solana token launchpad; BEN is an official character-style Meme token launched by Flap to showcase the "Stock Meme" product concept; ZCAT is a Zcash-themed Solana Meme token launched on StonkFun, featuring a cat with its face covered by a paper bag.
Coinbase announced on the X platform that cbHYPE and cbZEC are now live on the Base network. cbHYPE and cbZEC are Coinbase-custodied B20 tokens pegged to Hyperliquid (HYPE) and Zcash (ZEC) at a 1:1 ratio.
According to CoinDesk, developers of the privacy blockchain Zcash have released an open-source cryptographic toolkit named Zakura Common, aimed at improving the efficiency of private transaction generation and verification. In certain scenarios, the tool can reduce the time wallets take to create private transactions from over 3 seconds to under 200 milliseconds.
Odaily News: Privacy-focused cryptocurrency Zcash has risen about 19 times over the past year, yet its market cap remains less than 1% of Bitcoin's. Digital asset management firm Grayscale stated that financial privacy, cybersecurity development, and cross-chain connectivity capabilities could drive Zcash to further expand its market share.As of August 29, Bitcoin's market cap stood at $1.56 trillion, while Zcash's market cap was $13.74 billion—approximately 0.88% of Bitcoin's, with Bitcoin's market cap being roughly 114 times larger. Grayscale estimates that if ZEC were to reach 2%, 5%, and 10% of Bitcoin's market cap, the corresponding prices would be $1,622, $4,054, and $8,109, respectively. These scenarios are not price predictions.On August 25, Grayscale's Zcash ETF began trading on NYSE Arca under the ticker ZCSH, moving from OTCQX to NYSE Arca, providing investors with exposure to spot ZEC without needing to directly purchase tokens or manage wallets and private keys.Zcash utilizes a proof-of-work consensus mechanism with a fixed supply of 21 million coins, and supports the concealment of transaction details through zero-knowledge proofs. Its intents technology can coordinate cross-chain transactions based on user goals, such as converting other digital assets into ZEC. (Bitcoin.com News)
According to the latest report released by Grayscale Research Director Zach Pandl, as U.S. federal debt surpasses $40 trillion, Bitcoin's 90-day correlation with the Nasdaq 100 Index has dropped from over 60% to approximately 33%, while its correlation with gold has risen from near zero at the start of the year to above 50%, indicating that Bitcoin is shifting from a high-beta risk asset to an inflation-resistant store of value. Grayscale believes that expanding fiscal deficits and rising long-end interest rates will drive investors toward scarce alternative assets, positioning Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Zcash as primary beneficiaries. Among them, Zcash, featuring financial privacy, quantum resistance, and cross-chain interoperability, is considered to have the potential to challenge Bitcoin's network effect, despite its market capitalization currently accounting for less than 1% of Bitcoin's. Additionally, Grayscale notes that the current Bitcoin bear market has persisted for roughly 10 months, approaching the historical average bear market cycle of 11–12 months. Coupled with a macroeconomic environment that is becoming increasingly supportive, it suggests that current prices may represent a favorable entry point for long-term investors.
Odaily News: Digital asset investment platform Rockawayx has acquired digital asset hedge fund Relayer Capital, incorporating its directional long/short strategy into its approximately $2 billion investment platform. Relayer Capital founder Austin Barack will continue to oversee the strategy and assume the role of Chief Investment Officer of the newly renamed Rockawayx Liquid Opportunities Fund.Rockawayx CEO Viktor Fischer stated that the fund will invest in highly liquid crypto tokens and digital asset-related equities, with a focus on identifying assets that are mispriced relative to their business fundamentals, market position, or growth prospects. The fund is currently open to new external investors.Rockawayx disclosed that the strategy's estimated net return from the start of 2026 through August 21 stands at approximately 70%, outperforming a weighted portfolio of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana by 86 percentage points. Major contributing positions include Venice AI, Hyperliquid, Grass Network, Pump.fun, and Zcash, with investment themes centered on AI and tokenized real-world asset markets.The acquisition adds a directional liquid strategy to Rockawayx's venture capital and market-neutral businesses. Rockawayx also operates infrastructure and onchain liquidity divisions, noting that these capabilities support its team in identifying blockchain market opportunities across stages—from early-stage funding and token issuance to public market trading. (Bitcoin.com News)
Odaily News Digital asset manager Grayscale Investments' Chief Legal Officer Craig Salm stated that the company's Zcash investment product has been upgraded to the world's first Zcash Exchange-Traded Product (ETP), marking a move of privacy-focused crypto assets into broader compliant investment channels. Following the launch of this Zcash ETP, investors can gain exposure to ZEC through SEC-registered traditional financial products. Grayscale noted that this signifies the Zcash ecosystem, after nearly a decade of development, is entering a new phase of institutionalization.Salm recalled that Grayscale launched the Zcash Investment Trust in 2018, when the ZEC trust product was just one of four products offered by the company. After years of regulatory engagement, the product was recently converted into the Zcash ETP, with the ticker symbol ZCSH. The process of bringing the Zcash product to the public market was not easy. Due to ZEC's privacy features, the company underwent greater regulatory scrutiny when launching its first publicly quoted Zcash fund in 2021, but ultimately completed the product rollout.Data shows that the adoption rate of Zcash's private transaction features has been steadily rising recently. In February 2026, ZEC shielded transactions reached an all-time high of 59.3% of total transactions, and after the latest Ironwood upgrade, it has again approached this level. Currently, the shielded pool holds approximately 4.4 million ZEC, accounting for about 26% of the circulating supply.
Odaily News: THORChain announced the launch of version 3.20, adding native cross-chain swap support for Monero (XMR) and Zcash (ZEC). Users can directly swap XMR and ZEC for Bitcoin, ETH, and stablecoins without wrapping assets, registering on centralized exchange accounts, or relinquishing asset custody. This upgrade also introduces Protocol-Owned Liquidity (POL) and Stable Reserve, and restores support for Solana, Base, and BNB. Among these, Stable Reserve supports zero-liquidity-fee swaps between stablecoins.
Odaily News - Digital asset manager Grayscale's Zcash ETF began trading on NYSE Arca on Tuesday under the ticker ZCSH. The product is the world's first exchange-traded product offering spot exposure to Zcash, allowing investors to track ZEC prices through securities accounts without needing to directly purchase or store the token.ZCSH was formerly known as the Grayscale Zcash Trust, established in October 2017 through a private placement. Grayscale filed an application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in November 2025 to convert the trust into an ETF, with shareholders holding shares that track the fund's ZEC holdings rather than holding ZEC directly.In May of this year, security researcher Taylor Hornby, using Anthropic's Claude Opus 4.8, discovered a vulnerability in Zcash's Orchard shielded pool that had existed for four years, which could potentially allow attackers to mint counterfeit ZEC. Developers deployed an emergency patch on June 1, but due to privacy mechanisms, it was not possible to cryptographically confirm whether the vulnerability had been exploited.Zcash activated the Ironwood upgrade in July, replacing Orchard with a new shielded pool and introducing accounting rules that limit the amount of ZEC exiting the old shielded pool to no more than the amount entering. Grayscale stated it will monitor the adoption of the Ironwood upgrade, network security, exchange support, and regulatory conditions for privacy assets. (Decrypt)
According to a Grayscale research report, as AI-driven financial monitoring capabilities continue to expand, the demand for financial privacy is experiencing a third wave of renewed interest, potentially benefiting Zcash (ZEC). The report notes that Zcash’s zero-knowledge proof-based shielded transaction technology conceals the sender, recipient, and transaction amount, establishing a differentiated positioning compared to Bitcoin’s transparent on-chain records. Current on-chain data shows that shielded transactions now account for approximately 90% of Zcash’s total network transaction volume, while shielded supply has reached around 4.2 million ZEC, representing 25% of the circulating supply, with both figures hitting all-time highs. In terms of valuation, ZEC holds a market capitalization of approximately $8 billion, accounting for only 0.6% of the total market cap within Grayscale's "Cryptocurrency Monetary Sector". If its market share increases to 5%, the theoretical valuation space would be roughly nine times the current level. The report also cautions that Zcash faces multiple risks, including regulatory compliance, legacy issues from historical trusted setups, quantum computing threats, and protocol upgrade execution challenges, requiring investors to conduct prudent assessments.
Grayscale has filed the fourth amendment to the registration statement for the Grayscale Zcash Trust (ZEC) with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, planning to list the trust on the NYSE Arca market under the ticker symbol ZCSH. Upon completion of the listing, Authorized Participants will be able to continuously subscribe and redeem trust shares, differing from the previous model where trading was limited to the over-the-counter market and redemptions were not supported.
Cypherpunk Mining signed a $33.33 million agreement with Winklevoss Capital, deploying 4.2 Gsol/s hashrate to become the world's largest Zcash miner, producing approximately 7,800 ZEC per month.
The independent organization Zcash Labs officially launched on Wednesday, aiming to help enterprises overcome obstacles in adopting the privacy cryptocurrency Zcash (ZEC). Its early work focus includes providing technical integration and support, as well as funding projects that help expand real-world use cases for ZEC.