Zcash Extends October Rally: What’s Driving the Wave?

The token belonging to privacy blockchain Zcash has more than tripled in less than two weeks, reaching its highest price in more than three years amid a broader crypto rally that favored some assets more than others.

Zcash is posting double-digit gains, rising 26% to $170 in the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko data, after surging more than 140% in just under 14 days. As a result, nearly $2 million in short positions have been liquidated, CoinGlass data shows.

The rally comes from a combination of new institutional access and influential messages of support on social media, experts said Declutter.

“The recent price increase can be largely attributed to Grayscale recently allowing eligible investors to gain exposure through their funds, along with prominent voices such as investor Naval Ravikant voicing his support,” Sean Dawson, head of research at on-chain options platform Dervie, told me. Declutter.

The analyst’s comments align with sentiment data from crypto research platform Messari, which shows Zcash’s mindshare has increased by 1,000% in recent weeks.

The token has drawn social media mentions from prominent crypto personalities including Ravikant, an American venture capitalist, and Mert Mumtaz, CEO of Solana infrastructure company Helius Labs, which accelerated its breakout rally after a muted three-year sideways trend. Declutter earlier reported.

Zcash is a privacy-focused cryptocurrency that allows users to send and receive transactions privately using zero-knowledge proofs to encrypt transaction information.

Unlike Bitcoin or Ethereum, Zcash supports completely private transactions through its shielded addresses, which can hide information about the sender, recipient, and amount on-chain.

“Bitcoin is insurance against fiat. ZCash is insurance against Bitcoin,” Ravikant wrote, speaking about Zcash’s privacy nature in a tweet on October 1.

Dawson added that in the context of Bitcoin’s surge, “investors are looking for outsized returns in related projects – a ZK version of Bitcoin is attractive.”

Some top altcoins have outperformed others this year, with tokens like Chainlink, Cardano, Sui, and Dogecoin posting performances ranging from single-digit gains to double-digit losses.

Finding individual “sources of power” with altcoins like Zcash is not uncommon, despite the largely institutionally driven capital flows of the current cycle, Peter Chung, head of research at Presto Research, told me. Declutter on Wednesday.