The Winklevi are rotating to Zcash.

Cypherpunk, a brand new crypto treasury company backed by twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, is deploying over $50 million into the Bitcoin fork. As of the launch on November 12, the firm already holds 203,775 of the privacy coins and is shooting for ownership 5% of total supply.

“Privacy’s become a rare, vanishing commodity,” Tyler Winklevoss said on X. “We feel strongly that Zcash could become a meaningful percentage of Bitcoin’s market capitalisation just on the merits of it being a privacy hedge or insurance policy to Bitcoin’s transparency alone.”

Cypherpunk’s launch marks one of the most high-profile bets yet that privacy will become the next flashpoint in crypto. The move comes as the Zcash Foundation is shaking up its leadership, and as state actors intensify crackdowns on privacy technology.

Zcash’s price has soared over 1,000% this year, and is trading at over $500. Venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz and crypto investment manager Galaxy Digital have also noted the buzz around Zcash and other privacy-focused crypto projects.

The billionaire crypto investors are best known for buying 70,000 Bitcoin in 2013 at $150 and for founding the Gemini Space Station crypto exchange.

‘Separating Money and State’

Zcash creator Zooko Wilcox praised the moment on X. “Proud that Zcash has drawn people like [Will McEvoy, CIO of Cypherpunk] and the Winklevosses who are here for the right reasons.”

“Tyler Winklevoss just said something awesome about ‘separating money and state.’ Something like ‘Have we really done that? And the answer is no, unless you’re using Zcash’,” Wilcox said.

“If Bitcoin is digital gold, Zcash is encrypted bitcoin, or digital cash,” Tyler Winklevoss said.

“One is your store of value, the other is how you privately move your value,” he added. “We’ve been tracking this symbiosis for years and believe that now — as we enter the age of AI — is the right time to begin accumulating ZEC ($504.23).”

Arthur Hayes, also a big Zcash bull, advised investors to self-custody their coins rather than leave it on centralised exchanges.

“If you hold $ZEC on a CEX, withdraw it to a self-custodial wallet and shield it,” he said on X.

“It’s one of the few 1,000x opportunities in crypto remaining,” Carter Razink, co-founder of blockchain commerce platform spree.Finance, told DL News.

Battle over privacy

To be sure, not everyone is supportive of privacy coins.

EU lawmakers view private crypto as incompatible with laws designed to prevent money-laundering, terrorism financing, and other financial crimes.

They have approved a bill that will ban exchanges from listing privacy coins like Zcash and Monero, with implementation expected in 2027.

And high-profile criminal prosecutions in the US and Europe have targeted developers behind privacy-enabling blockchain solutions.

In the Netherlands, Alexey Pertsev, co-founder of Tornado Cash, was convicted of money laundering in 2024. Dutch prosecutors argued that the protocol enabled criminals to hide stolen funds. Pertsev denied wrongdoing, but the court ruled that building software that obscures transactions can itself constitute facilitation of laundering.

In the US, Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm was convicted of conspiring to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business.

Another major case came last week when Samourai Wallet co-founder Keonne Rodriguez received the maximum five-year sentence for operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business. Prosecutors accused the project of “soliciting, encouraging, and inviting criminals” to use its privacy features.

Lance Datskoluo is DL News’ Europe-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? lance@dlnews.com.