[Generated Title]: Zcash's "Privacy Surge" Is Bullshit. Here's Why.
Okay, let's be real. This whole Zcash "privacy surge" smells like a marketing campaign gone wild. +700% since September? Give me a break. I've seen pump-and-dumps with more subtlety.
Economist Lyn Alden calls it a "coordinated token pump," and I'm inclined to agree. Investor Naval Ravikant's counter-argument about government crackdowns? Convenient, isn't it? Like clockwork.
Privacy? More Like a Fig Leaf.
They keep saying Zcash fixes Bitcoin's privacy problem, pointing to Satoshi's own admission that Bitcoin ain't exactly Fort Knox. Fine. But let's not pretend Zcash is some kind of revolutionary solution. It's optional privacy. Optional. Meaning most people won't bother using it correctly.
And offcourse, the Samourai Wallet guys got arrested and Wasabi shut down their CoinJoin feature. So now everyone's suddenly a Zcash maximalist? Please.
Zcash uses zk-SNARKs, zero-knowledge proofs that supposedly hide everything. Sounds great in theory, right? Except it's not that simple. You need to use shielded addresses. And even then, there are opsec mistakes you can make that blow the whole thing. It's like wearing a bulletproof vest with the zipper open.
And remember Monero? The one that actually tries to make privacy mandatory? Regulators hate it. The IRS even paid Chainalysis to crack it. Is Zcash any different? Not really. Just more palatable to the suits.
The Numbers Don't Lie (Or Do They?)
They're bragging about how >30% of the ZEC supply is now in shielded pools. Big deal. That still leaves almost 70% exposed. And a bigger anonymity set only matters if people actually USE it. Are they? Or are they just buying ZEC hoping someone else will shield their coins for them?
The Zashi wallet is supposed to make things easier. NEAR Intents are supposed to let you move coins in and out of Zcash without leaving a trace. Okay, fine. UX improvements are always welcome. But let's not confuse usability with actual privacy. It's like putting lipstick on a pig...a slightly less ugly pig, maybe.
Speaking of numbers, Zcash only has 100-120 full nodes. Bitcoin has like, 24,000. Monero has 4,000. Why so few? Because running a Zcash node is a resource hog. Each shielded transaction needs to be verified with zk-SNARKs, which requires more CPU and memory. So much for decentralization.
And "Project Tachyon?" Solving "every bottleneck with relatively simple cryptography?" Yeah, I'll believe it when I see it. Sounds like classic crypto vaporware to me.
The Real Reason for the Pump
So, why the surge? A16z says Google searches for privacy are up. Okay. People are worried about surveillance. I get it. But are they actually switching to Zcash? Or are they just panicking and buying whatever coin is being shilled the hardest? Why Has Zcash Suddenly Soared?
Hyperliquid listed ZEC perps. So what? That just means traders can gamble on its price going up or down. It doesn't mean Zcash is suddenly a good project. It just means there's more liquidity for the pump.
The Electric Coin Company can claim it's "encrypted Bitcoin" all they want. It ain't. Bitcoin is transparent. Zcash is...selectively opaque. And that's a huge difference.
So, What's the Real Story?
It's simple: Hype. Fear. And a desperate attempt to stay relevant. Zcash had its moment. It missed it. Now it's trying to buy its way back into the conversation. And honestly, it's kinda sad to watch.
