Zcash Breaks Above 2018 Peak; ZEC Futures Open Interest Nearly Doubles

Zcash (ZEC) has surged to its strongest level since 2018, jumping to $888 before easing back to around $843, CoinDesk reported. The token is up more than 50% over the past four days and has added about 7% in the last 24 hours. The rally has spilled into derivatives markets. Data from crypto derivatives platform Loris Tools shows ZEC perpetuals open interest climbed from $962.5 million on Aug. 19 to $1.8 billion by Monday, nearly doubling in five days. Twenty-four-hour trading volume reached $5.3 billion. Open interest measures the notional value of outstanding contracts that have not been closed. Funding conditions point to heavy demand for long exposure. ZEC's average 8-hour funding rate stands at 0.0106%, suggesting traders are paying to maintain bullish positions. Elevated futures activity can also magnify price swings: continued upside may trigger short covering that pushes prices higher, while a downturn could spark cascading liquidations of leveraged longs. ETF conversion filing lifts visibility Attention on Zcash has been building over the past year as some investors look for alternatives beyond bitcoin. As a privacy-focused cryptocurrency, Zcash supports stronger transaction confidentiality through features such as shielded balances, in contrast to Bitcoin and Ethereum, where on-chain data is publicly visible by default. Interest intensified in November last year after Grayscale filed to convert its Zcash Trust into an ETF. The application remains under regulatory review. Post-incident upgrade completed ZEC sold off sharply in June, falling from $635 to $309, after developers disclosed a flaw in the Orchard shielded pool identified using Claude Opus 4.8. The issue could, in theory, allow undetectable counterfeit minting. The team issued an emergency patch in June and activated the Ironwood upgrade in July, which disabled Orchard and introduced new accounting safeguards designed to contain any anomalous ZEC within the legacy pool. Developers said at the time they could not confirm whether the vulnerability had been exploited. Mining expansion adds support In August, Cypherpunk Technologies, backed by the Winklevoss brothers, launched Zcash mining operations. The company estimates its hash power now represents about 18% of global network capacity. It holds roughly 323,394 ZEC, valued at about $268 million at the cited price, and plans to keep accumulating with the goal of acquiring 5% of the circulating supply.