A whale address holding Zcash moved about $362 million worth of ZEC overnight, and sent $15 million of it to an exchange, the first deposit from that address in 10 months, as the privacy coin pushed above $1,550 and short sellers absorbed heavy losses. The moves, tracked by Arkham and BlockBeats, landed as ZEC set fresh record territory and derivatives traders scrambled to cover bearish bets.
The address, identified on-chain as t1Lyq, made its transfers during the night of September 19. On-chain monitoring shows $15 million of ZEC deposited to a centralized exchange, which analysts read as a possible sell signal. After months of accumulation, a 10-month exchange deposit from a wallet of this size tends to attract attention, though large holders often move coins between wallets for custody reasons as well. The deposit came at a sensitive moment, with ZEC pressing against its highest levels ever and liquidation data showing bearish positions being flushed out in size.
ZEC traded near $1,577 early Saturday, up roughly 6 percent in 24 hours and about 46 percent on the week, with a market cap of about $26.4 billion that places it ninth among digital assets. The token has risen roughly 215 percent since mid-August, when it changed hands near $470, and sits up more than 2,300 percent over twelve months. Daily trading volume has run between $1.3 billion and $1.8 billion, elevated even by the standards of a market that has been in motion for weeks.
Short sellers take the hit
The rally has been expensive for bears. A derivatives trader closed a $24.43 million ZEC short at $1,548, locking in a realized loss of about $10.68 million, according to exchange data cited by Phemex. The same trader had a 79 percent win rate and roughly $9.11 million in prior profits since June, all of which the ZEC position erased. The liquidation price on the remaining book sat near $1,551, and the market blew through it.
Across the market, ZEC short liquidations reached about $27.17 million over 24 hours, part of $32.7 million in total ZEC liquidations. Another large address, carrying a short with an average entry near $866, triggered seven consecutive stop-losses on September 18 for roughly $5.2 million in realized losses. That position, once valued at $23.5 million, was partially cut and still faces estimated liquidation near $1,550. A separate trader, Garret Jin, recorded paper losses above $26 million on a $51.5 million short when ZEC touched $1,400 earlier in the week. Open interest across ZEC contracts jumped 29 percent in a single day this week, with the long-short ratio showing long exposure concentrated among a few large holders, a setup that cuts both ways if momentum stalls.
ETF money and mining capacity
Institutional flows have added fuel. Grayscale’s spot Zcash ETF, ZCSH, launched August 25 and has drawn more than $233 million in cumulative inflows, holding roughly $890 million in net assets as of September 17. On Thursday alone it absorbed $46.56 million, its second-largest daily inflow since launch, even as ether and XRP funds saw withdrawals. Grayscale announced a 3-for-1 forward share split on September 18, with record date September 28 and split-adjusted trading from September 30. Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang has said his firm holds ZEC, describing it as a privacy-focused counterpart to bitcoin.
Miners have responded to the price. The network’s hash rate climbed from about 25 GSol/s in late August to nearly 32 GSol/s, an increase of roughly 28 percent, while mining difficulty reached record levels around 291 million. Fortitude, the Zcash-focused miner carved out of Foundry by Digital Currency Group, mined 72,696 ZEC in the first half of 2026, about 28 percent of network production, and reported second-quarter revenue of $20.9 million against a $9.5 million net loss. It operates more than 60 megawatts across seven sites and has ordered 9,000 Bitmain Antminer Z15 Pro machines for delivery this quarter. The company appointed former Hut 8 chief executive Jaime Leverton as its CEO effective September 21 and is preparing for a Nasdaq listing through a merger with HeartSciences at an implied valuation of at least $400 million.
NU7 upgrade in the pipeline
The rally also has a technical catalyst. Developers have set November 5 for the NU7 network upgrade, which cuts block times from 75 seconds to 25 seconds while keeping daily issuance flat through a smaller per-block reward. Holders voted 99.9 percent in favor of faster blocks, and 98.9 percent to keep bitcoin-style halvings, in a governance vote published this week. The advisory panel itself split 57 to 54 on the halving question. Testnet activation is scheduled for October 6, with a final mainnet decision on October 20 after a performance review. NU7 introduces no new transaction formats, so wallet impact should be limited, though full nodes, indexers and block explorers may need adjustments.
Not everyone in the community is comfortable with the direction. Dragonfly partner Qureshi has proposed ending the Zcash development fund after 2028, reopening a long-running debate over protocol funding. The Zcash Foundation reported $36.7 million in liquid assets earlier this year, most of it held in ZEC itself, a figure that has swelled in dollar terms as the token rallied.
The on-chain picture remains mixed. On one side, whale withdrawals of 15,300 ZEC worth about $17.9 million from Binance, OKX and Kraken suggest accumulation, and about 29 percent of circulating supply sits in shielded pools. On the other, the t1Lyq deposit and near-record prices point to profit taking. With ZEC up more than 100 percent in a month, analysts are watching the $1,550 to $1,585 zone, where liquidation walls and exchange deposits have clustered. A decisive close above $1,600 would open uncharted ground. A rejection could pull the price back toward the $1,400 level that served as resistance earlier this week.