Zcash’s powerful rally continues to outpace anything observable on-chain, raising questions about whether price action is being driven by speculative positioning rather than genuine expansion in its user base. While Monero still reflects steady, baseline demand for privacy-focused assets, Zcash’s behavior looks increasingly disconnected from measurable network activity.
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Zcash (ZEC$492.54) has emerged as one of the year’s strongest performers, handing investors substantial gains even as bitcoin and ether have retreated. Yet the network data available to analysts shows little evidence that user growth or transaction activity is rising in a way that would justify such an outsized move.
Zcash’s hybrid privacy architecture makes visibility challenging. Only the transparent side of the chain can be observed directly, and that slice of activity—mostly exchange-facing flows—has remained remarkably stable. The shielded side, where addresses and amounts are hidden, cannot be tracked, limiting analysts’ ability to confirm whether private-side adoption is accelerating at a pace consistent with ZEC’s rally.
The one major spike in visible activity occurred during the brief Zerdinals inscription episode, when daily transactions temporarily surpassed 70,000. Even then, the number of unique transparent senders stayed between 8,000 and 14,000, suggesting the surge came from a small number of high-frequency actors rather than broad user expansion. After the inscription burst passed, transparent activity reverted to normal levels.
Still, Zcash has quietly been shifting more of its supply into the Orchard shielded pool. Shielded balances have climbed from roughly 1.2 million to more than 4 million ZEC over several years, with fully shielded transactions reaching new highs. Improvements such as Unified Addresses, automatic shielding and Zashi’s default-private interface appear to be drawing more flows into the private ecosystem—activity that, by design, leaves no public footprint.
If a true, sector-wide rush into privacy coins were underway, Monero’s metrics would likely reflect it. Instead, Monero’s daily transactions remain in a consistent 20,000–30,000 range, offering no sign of a corresponding pickup in activity. That stability suggests ZEC’s rally is not part of a broad privacy renaissance but rather a Zcash-specific rotation influenced by liquidity conditions, shrinking visible supply and a strong narrative around improving shielded UX.
Despite differing privacy models, both networks show limited evidence of growing user counts. Zcash’s transparent data reveals no meaningful rise in participation, and its private activity—while increasing—cannot be quantified. With about 30% of ZEC supply now locked in shielded addresses and therefore inaccessible to exchanges, the reduced float may be propelling prices ahead of what traditional fundamentals can justify.
Until user-level confirmation emerges from wallets, bridges or ecosystem activity, traders may be paying a premium that reflects scarcity rather than adoption.
Market Overview
- BTC: Hovering near $86,800 after surrendering its Nvidia-driven spike above $93,000
- ETH: Trading around $2,850, pressured by renewed selling from FG Nexus
- Gold: Near $4,077, roughly 7% below its October high but still up more than 50% this year
- Nikkei 225: Down 1.58% after hot October inflation revived expectations of BOJ tightening and concerns over yen weakness
Additional Headlines
• Crypto lobby groups push Trump to act amid unclear congressional leadership (CoinDesk)
• Ray Dalio says he still owns bitcoin but remains uneasy about quantum risks and traceability (Decrypt)
• MegaETH to open pre-deposits for its USDm stablecoin next week (The Block)
