Zcash soars 3,000%: Why Bitcoin billionaires are betting on the privacy coin

Zcash has surged about 3,000% over the past year and this has drawn investment from Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss and Barry Silbert, two prominent figures from Bitcoin’s early days. Their businesses are expanding their exposure to the privacy-focused cryptocurrency through mining operations and investment products.

The rally has brought renewed attention to Zcash, which allows users to conceal transactions. Growing concerns about the visibility of activity on public blockchains have helped put financial privacy back in focus, while investors are also looking for opportunities in cryptocurrencies beyond Bitcoin.

Bitcoin’s Early Investors Turn Their Attention to Zcash

The Winklevoss twins made an early bet on Bitcoin and built businesses around the cryptocurrency. Barry Silbert, founder of Digital Currency Group (DCG), also discovered Bitcoin around 2012, invested early and established funds that gave other investors a way to bet on its rise.


The relationship between the two has involved both partnership and rivalry, including a high-profile fallout over the collapse of the Gemini Earn program.

Now, both sides are building their presence in Zcash. Speaking at the Token2049 conference in Singapore earlier in October 2026, Cameron Winklevoss compared the opportunity to Bitcoin’s early days. He said investors who wished they had bought Bitcoin earlier now had a similar opportunity with Zcash, as per a report.

Zcash Mining Firms Plan to Spend Millions on More Computing Power

The investment push extends beyond buying the token. Cypherpunk Technologies, backed by the Winklevoss twins, and Fortitude Mining, backed by Silbert, are among Zcash’s largest mining operations. Both firms plan to spend tens of millions of dollars on additional computing power.

Zcash miners compete for a limited supply of newly issued tokens. More computing power improves a miner’s chances of earning rewards, but miners are competing for tokens released periodically under the network’s supply rules.

Cypherpunk accounts for about 20% of Zcash’s mining power. Fortitude has said it expects to reach a similar share after its latest equipment additions. The growing presence of large mining operations has raised questions about the concentration of mining power across the network.

Why Zcash’s Privacy Features Are Attracting Investors

Zcash launched about a decade ago, but renewed concerns about financial privacy have brought it back into focus. Artificial intelligence is making it easier to track activity on public blockchains, while kidnappings and violent robberies targeting cryptocurrency investors have heightened concerns about exposing personal wealth.

A US ruling in March 2025 helped remove many uncertainties surrounding privacy coins. During the subsequent rally, prominent crypto figures, including Arthur Hayes, promoted Zcash as a potential hedge against Bitcoin.

Thomas Probst, a research analyst at Kaiko, told Bloomberg that privacy had become a prominent market theme before endorsements from well-known investors helped draw money into Zcash.

Grayscale’s Zcash ETF Faces a Potential Rival

Investment products are another part of the growing market. In August 2026, DCG’s Grayscale launched the first Zcash exchange-traded fund in the United States. The fund was converted from a trust established in 2013 for accredited investors.

The Winklevoss twins filed for their own Zcash ETF earlier in October 2026, setting up another potential entry into the market.

Zcash has a fixed supply cap. Bloomberg reported that this scarcity has helped amplify the token’s price gains as capital flows into the cryptocurrency.

Security and Regulatory Risks Remain

The rally has also drawn attention to Zcash’s security and the concentration of its mining power. In May 2026, a security researcher used Anthropic’s Claude to uncover a critical vulnerability that had gone undetected for years. The flaw could have allowed counterfeit tokens to be created without limit.

Privacy coins also face regulatory uncertainty. Stricter compliance requirements or concerns about their potential use in illicit transactions could prompt closer scrutiny or bans.

Eric Jardine, head of research at Chainalysis told Bloomberg that, “Potential risks related to privacy coins stem from the lack of transparency regarding activities and transactions,” adding, “Illicit actors might abuse them to avoid detection by law enforcement.”

Investor enthusiasm may also shift. Crypto markets have seen investors move between coins, non-fungible tokens, memecoins and, more recently, AI-related securities and perpetual futures. Alexander Blume, founder and chief executive of Two Prime, said some investors are less committed to a cryptocurrency’s underlying technology than to the prospect of making money from further price gains.