Over the weekend, Zcash pushed to its highest price in years. The privacy coin climbed to roughly $1,249 before settling near $1,195 on Monday, according to CoinGecko. That works out to a gain of around 45% over the past week and 138% in the last month. The rally also puts Zcash’s market cap above $20 billion for the first time in this cycle.
The last time ZEC traded around these levels was 2016. That period is a little tricky to compare because only a small number of tokens existed back then. CoinGecko lists an all-time high of $3,191.93 from Oct. 28, 2016. So even after this surge, the coin is still far below that record.
Why Zcash is moving
The recent push started after Grayscale converted its Zcash Trust into an exchange-traded fund. That product, trading under the ticker ZCSH, began trading on NYSE Arca on Aug. 25. It gives regular brokerage investors a way to hold ZEC without dealing with wallets or exchanges directly. According to the fund website, ZCSH closed Friday at $83.77 per share with about $463.2 million in assets under management. Markets were closed Monday for Labor Day.
Zcash’s core appeal is privacy. Users can choose between transparent transactions and shielded ones. Shielded transactions use zero-knowledge proofs to verify payment details without showing the sender, recipient, or amount. That feature has always been important to a certain group, but some analysts think it could become more valuable over time.
Grayscale’s head of research, Zach Pandl, noted in late August that privacy might become a “must have” feature for certain users. He also made an interesting point about artificial intelligence. As AI tools improve, it may become easier to connect public blockchain activity to real identities. That could push more people toward private options like Zcash.
Privacy demand may grow slowly
Still, I’m not sure this is a straight line upward. Privacy coins tend to have ups and downs. Regulatory pressure has historically been a problem for them. Zcash itself has faced delistings or restrictions in some places. And while the ETF launch brings new attention, it doesn’t remove the underlying uncertainties around privacy assets.
That said, the market is clearly paying attention right now. Volume is up, sentiment is strong, and the ETF gives a more convenient route for institutional or retail investors. Whether this can hold depends on broader crypto conditions and how much demand there really is for shielded payments.
For now, Zcash is having its best moment since the earliest days of the project. The price still has a long way to go before revisiting its record high, but the recent move has definitely put it back on the map.
