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a focused privacy cryptography, has surpassed the long dominant symbol of the sector, in the capitalization of the market in what may represent a change of guard.
ZEC’s market cap surpassed XMR for the first time on Friday, sitting above its older pair for several hours after climbing nearly 50% in seven days. It held that position for most of the weekend, climbing up to $7.2 million while XMR stayed around $6.3 billion. Both were recently valued at similar levels around $6.4 billion.
While traders cited technical measures such as increased trading volumes, a technical breakout from long-term resistance and Half of the November block reward as immediate catalysts for the manifestation of ZEC, fundamental factors may also be at play.
A key difference between zcash, which started in 2016, is its optional model-privacy. Users are able to choose between transparent and screened transactions, a facility that monero, introduced in 2014, lacks. This flexibility may help ZEC gain support from merchants and institutions seeking privacy without the regulatory baggage that weighed down XMR, which remains delisted from many major exchanges.
“Unlike monero, which will likely remain unavailable on major Western-regulated exchanges, zcash offers flexibility, with optional privacy that can be turned on when needed,” Ray Youssef, CEO of the NoOnes app, said in an email interview.
“This gives institutions room to maintain compliance and reporting, making ZEC an acceptable regulatory asset, while XMR remains toxic from an AML and KYC compliance perspective,” he said in reference to anti-money laundering and know-your-customer requirements.
There is also Zashi CrossPaya privacy-preserving cross-chain payment protocol, which has positioned zcash as a potential privacy layer for broader crypto networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Zcash’s recent gains are part of a long-term boom in its price, which has jumped nearly 1,000% in the past three monthsCoinDesk data shows. Monero, meanwhile, increased only 11.5%.
Another factor behind ZEC’s outperformance could be the influence of crypto analyst and commentator Arthur Hayes, who has zcash expected to reach $10,000 per coin in numerous places on X in the last week. Hayes is a notable figure in the crypto industry for his bold and sometimes contrarian views
