Zcash just reminded everyone that privacy coins aren’t dead. They were just napping.

ZEC’s market capitalization ballooned by $1 billion in less than 24 hours during a rally that saw the token surge over 30% on May 6, pushing prices near $607. By May 9, ZEC had climbed above $614, landing a total market cap of roughly $10.2 billion and crashing the party of the top 15 crypto assets by capitalization.

Trading volume told the same story, exceeding $1 billion within a single 24-hour window during the peak of the move.

What lit the fuse

The catalyst came on May 5, when Multicoin Capital co-founder Tushar Jain disclosed that his firm had built a “significant position” in ZEC starting back in February. Multicoin isn’t some anonymous fund posting from a burner account. It’s one of the more influential crypto-native investment firms in the space, and when it places a visible bet, the market pays attention.

Jain’s thesis wasn’t complicated. Regulatory scrutiny on transparent blockchain holdings has been ratcheting up for months. When every wallet is a glass house, the argument for privacy-preserving technology gets a lot more compelling. Multicoin apparently decided that ZEC was the best way to play that trend.

Short sellers were caught flatfooted as the price ripped higher, with tens of millions of dollars in short positions liquidated during the rally. In English: traders who had bet ZEC would fall got steamrolled, and their forced buying only accelerated the upward move.

The surge wasn’t a one-day anomaly, either. ZEC had been building momentum over several weeks before the Multicoin disclosure. Over 30-day rolling periods, gains exceeded 100% in some stretches, suggesting that accumulation was happening well before the public announcement made it obvious.

Privacy coins find their moment

ZEC’s rally saw it challenge Monero in market-cap rankings. For years, XMR was the default privacy play. The fact that Zcash is now competing for that crown, backed by institutional capital rather than just cypherpunk ideology, signals a meaningful shift in how the market values these assets.

Discussions around a potential Robinhood listing for ZEC added another layer of speculative fuel. If Robinhood were to list a privacy coin, it would mark a significant reversal from the industry trend of removing such tokens.

The rally also coincided with increased adoption of Zcash’s shielded transactions, suggesting the demand isn’t purely speculative.

What this means for investors

The June 2026 correction illustrated exactly that risk. A disclosed vulnerability in Zcash’s Orchard shielded pool triggered a pullback, reminding investors that privacy tech comes with its own unique set of technical risks.

For those considering exposure to ZEC at these levels, the risk-reward calculus has changed substantially from where Multicoin started buying in February. The firm got in before the crowd. Anyone entering now is buying after a 100%-plus run and a $10 billion market cap, not exactly the same setup.

With tens of millions in shorts wiped out during the initial rally, the crowded-short thesis has largely played out. Future gains would need to be driven by genuine buying demand rather than the mechanical force of liquidation cascades.