What happened?
Zcash surged from September lows near $32 to about $542, gaining over 1,500% and outperforming most of the top 100 cryptocurrencies. Shielded supply hit record highs (around 16 million ZEC, roughly 76% of max supply), shielded transactions rose about 60% month‑over‑month, and trading volume jumped to roughly $1.6 billion. Technicals show an ascending trendline with Fibonacci extensions pointing to targets like $1,669 and $3,428, while analysts watch $1,000 as a key psychological level.
Who does this affect?
Zcash holders, traders, and privacy‑coin investors are the most directly affected by the rapid price moves and rising use of shielded transactions. Institutional and accredited investors are also impacted after Grayscale opened a Zcash Trust private placement, helping market cap climb from around $700 million to over $1.8 billion and now nearing $9 billion. Regulators, banks and crypto service providers matter here too, since the EU’s upcoming AML rules (Article 79) plan to ban anonymity‑enhanced tokens, which could restrict access to ZEC in Europe.
Why does this matter?
The rally signals growing demand for privacy features, which can redirect capital toward privacy coins and increase liquidity across that niche of the market. If ZEC breaks resistance with volume, momentum could push prices toward $1,000 and higher Fibonacci targets, attracting speculative flows and raising correlated asset prices; but a failure of the trendline could trigger a sharp correction toward $350–$400 and spill losses into related tokens. At the same time, the EU regulatory risk creates an asymmetric outlook—strong upside from adoption and institutional interest versus heightened downside and volatility if major jurisdictions move to restrict custody or trading.