Cypherpunk sees $10,000 Zcash potential as mining yields surge

what happened

Stocktwits reported that Zcash (ZEC) edged lower on Monday as Will McEvoy, chief investment officer at Winklevoss-backed Cypherpunk Technologies (CYPH), discussed the token’s mining economics on the Bankless podcast. He said Zcash mining generated about $1,000 per megawatt hour, well above Bitcoin (BTC) mining and AI hosting. Bitcoin miners shifting electricity to AI customers had lifted their figure from about $130 to around $240 per megawatt hour, McEvoy said. He called that “a good step up,” but said Zcash generated roughly four times as much.

ZEC fell more than 1% over the past 24 hours after giving back an earlier 4% gain. Retail sentiment on Stocktwits remained in the “extremely bearish” zone, while discussion levels stayed low. McEvoy said Cypherpunk should not be valued like a standard crypto treasury company. Including warrants, its enterprise value was about $1 billion, divided roughly between $500 million in ZEC and its mining business.

Cypherpunk has not set a price target, but McEvoy said Zcash reaching 10% of Bitcoin’s value appeared “fairly reasonable” given its technology and privacy features. He said that would imply “something like a $10,000 Zcash price.” The mining margin remained high because only a small number of machines could mine Zcash. Bitmain was the only manufacturer, likely producing only a few thousand units monthly. A new order would take about 7 to 8 months, and “probably longer than that.”

Cypherpunk controls about 18% of Zcash’s computing power, or hash rate, and plans to keep that share between 18% and 20%. A filing showed the company held around 323 thousand ZEC in August, equal to roughly 1.92% of the 21 million token supply. It aims to own 5% of ZEC, similar to Bitmine Immersion’s (BMNR) Ethereum (ETH) target known as the “Alchemy of 5%.”

why it matters

The reported gap in earnings per megawatt hour highlights the competition between crypto mining and AI for power and specialized hardware. Limited Zcash equipment may support margins while restricting how quickly Cypherpunk can expand.

instruments