My curiosity in cryptocurrency is primarily technical, and privateness cash are essentially the most technically attention-grabbing. The maths behind cash like Monero and Zcash is way extra refined than the mathematics behind Bitcoin.
I’m additionally within the privateness angle since I work in knowledge privateness. The zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) expertise developed for and examined in privateness cash is relevant exterior of cryptocurrency.
I don’t observe the worth of privateness cash, however I heard concerning the worth of Zcash doubling just lately.
I’d like to know why that occurred, particularly why it occurred so all of a sudden, although I’m very skeptical of publish hoc explanations of worth adjustments. I roll my eyes after I hear reporters say the inventory market moved up or down by some p.c due to this or that occasion. Any clarification for the combination conduct of a fancy system that matches into sound byte is unlikely to include greater than a kernel of reality.
Replace: The worth has gone up one other 65% within the two days since I wrote this publish.
Naval Ravikant mentioned on October 1
Bitcoin is insurance coverage towards fiat.
ZCash is insurance coverage towards Bitcoin.
This was after Zcash had began rising, so Naval’s assertion wasn’t the reason for the rise. However the thought behind his assertion was within the air earlier than he crystalized it. Perhaps the latest enhance within the worth of Bitcoin led to the rise of Zcash as a hedge towards Bitcoin falling. It’s inconceivable to know. Merchants don’t fill out questionnaires explaining their motivations.
It has been prompt that extra individuals are keen on utilizing Zcash as a privacy-preserving foreign money, not simply shopping for it for monetary hypothesis. It’s believable that this might be a contributing issue within the rise of Zcash, although curiosity in monetary privateness is unlikely to spike over the course of 1 week, barring one thing dramatic like FDR’s confiscation of personal gold in 1933.
The worth of Monero elevated together with Zcash, although not as by practically as a lot.
This means there could also be elevated curiosity in privateness cash extra usually and never simply in Zcash.
It will be attention-grabbing to see how individuals are utilizing Zcash and Monero—how a lot is being spent on items and providers and the way a lot is simply being traded as an funding—however this could be troublesome since privateness cash obscure the main points of transactions by design.
