The Zcash price rally has made the privacy coin the second-largest crypto holding for Maelstrom, Arthur Hayes’ family office.
Arthur Hayes announced on November 7 via X that the recent surge in the altcoin’s price has pushed it into second place among Maelstrom’s largest and most liquid cryptocurrency holdings.
Zcash (ZEC) price gains currently have ZEC sitting behind Bitcoin (BTC) in terms of the family office’s digital assets holdings by value, according to Hayes, the co-founder of crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX and chief investment officer of Maelstrom. He noted:
“Due to the rapid ascent in price, $ZEC is now the 2nd largest *LIQUID* holding in the Maelstrom portfolio behind $BTC.”
Hayes comments came as Zcash witnessed another bullish flip on Friday, with the privacy coin’s native token jumping to highs of $656. The intraday gains have extended ZEC’s rally to its highest mark since 2018, putting current levels at eight-year highs.
Hayes recently shared a “ludicrous” ZEC price prediction. Also shared on X, he posted that the top privacy coin could hit $10k, accompanied by a chart showing ZEC’s staggering gains.
Why is Zcash Price Up?
Driving the privacy coin’s price rally, now an impressive 3,800% bounce from lows of $15 in early June 2024, has been market exuberance around its shielded transactions. The token is up over 340% in the past month and by more than 1,300% in the past year.
Zcash’s privacy technology uses zero-knowledge proofs to allow users to “shield” their transactions by encrypting addresses, transaction amount, and memo field. The key is having ZEC use as completely private. The shielded ZEC supply on the network has soared to nearly 5 million.
Hayes believes shielded transactions are key to the next phase of adoption across decentralized exchanges.
“$ZEC shielded tx are going to power the next wave of true DEXs. What are your picks for the winners of a true privacy enabled DEX?”
The altcoin’s price has surged amid this growth.
Other tokens, including Dash, have also benefited from the privacy narrative.