Behind the 1460% Surge of ZEC: A Perfect Marketing Strategy for Mining Machine Sales?

The Myth's Starting Point, The Collapse's Foreshadowing

In just the past two months, Zcash ($ZEC) has become the most dazzling focus of the entire cryptocurrency market. From a surge to $50 at the end of September to a recent high of $730, the increase has reached an astonishing 1460%, with the FDV skyrocketing to a historical peak of $13B in 8 years.

https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/zcash

What further heightened the sentiment was the support from numerous top figures: endorsements from heavyweight personalities like @naval, @0xMert_, and @CryptoHayes acted as catalysts, igniting market FOMO and prompting many KOLs, retail investors, and even some funds to reassess this old chain. Uncommonly, both Chinese and English crypto communities are fervently discussing ZEC, the privacy narrative, and the resurgence of ZK technology, suggesting that Privacy may once again be hailed as the "next big trend" in the crypto market.

However, beneath this seemingly hot and perfect narrative, some key fundamental issues have been consistently overlooked: Can ZEC's miner economic model, network security, and on-chain interaction activity truly support an FDV exceeding $10 billion?

ZEC is on the Eve of a Typical Hardware–Price Scissors in PoW History

Before discussing the sustainability of any PoW project, the economic incentives on the mining side often reflect the chain's value capture ability most intuitively.

Let’s first calculate ZEC's current payback period:

1) Z15 Pro: The Most Mainstream Mining Machine

The most discussed and sought-after flagship mining machine for ZEC is the Bitmain Antminer Z15 Pro, with the following hardware specifications:

Hashrate: 840 KH/s
Power Consumption: 2780 W, actual operation around 2560 W
Energy Efficiency: 0.302 KH/W

Currently, the official website only has futures for the Z15 Pro, with delivery in April 2026, priced at $4,999. Those who can't wait can also purchase second-hand units on the black market, with real prices around 50,000 RMB.

https://m.bitmain.com/zh/product/detail?pid=00020251112140439260bFAoSY2F0667

2) ZEC's Hashrate and Mining Revenue Structure: Astonishing Daily Earnings

In the past two months, ZEC's high returns have rapidly attracted hashrate into the market, with the total network hashrate beginning to grow significantly, and difficulty entering a rising cycle. The chart clearly shows that ZEC's price (yellow line) began to break out of a sideways trend at the end of September, while hashrate (light purple) and difficulty (dark blue) rose in sync. This trend indicates that the mining side has started to respond to the price increase.

https://minerstat.com/coin/ZEC

As of the time of writing, the key parameters of the Zcash network are:

Total Network Hashrate: 13.31 GH/s
Network Difficulty: 118.68M
Block Reward: 2.5 ZEC / block

To calculate daily earnings, we input the Z15 Pro's parameters into a mining revenue calculator, using standard miner settings:

Pool Fee: 2%
Electricity Price: $0.08 / kWh
Daily Power Consumption Cost: $5.34 (2.78 kW × 24 hours × $0.08/kWh)

We can then arrive at an astonishing figure: the net earnings of a single Z15 Pro exceed $50 per day! Historical data shows that such high earnings have persisted for at least over a week.

https://whattomine.com/coins/166-zec-equihash

3) Payback Period: Extremely Rare High ROI

Assuming the network difficulty remains stable in the short term and electricity costs are steady, we calculate the payback period using the Z15 Pro mining machine's futures price of $4,999.

To reflect the true cost, we amortize the mining machine over 5 years (1826 days):

Daily Machine Cost Amortization: $2.74
Daily Net Earnings After Amortization: Approximately $47.63

Thus, the static payback period for a Z15 Pro is only about 105 days, translating to an annualized return rate of nearly 350%.

This figure is extremely rare in the entire history of PoW—one could even say it is abnormal:

The payback period for BTC mining machine upcycle typically ranges from 12 to 24 months.
The ROI for ETH during the PoW era was between 300 to 600 days.
Historically, PoW projects with payback periods under 120 days (like FIL, XCH, RVN, etc.) have almost all collapsed within months.
The latest BTC mining machines currently yield about $23 per day, with a static payback period of approximately 3.4 years.

4) Case Review: The Repeated Hardware–Price Scissors

The Hardware-Price Scissors is a recurring "harvesting" script in PoW mining history, where miners order mining machines at several times the price when the coin price is at its peak and FOMO sentiment is strongest (at this point, ROI appears extremely low, with a payback period of only 4 months). However, when the machines are actually delivered and the hashrate surges (usually delayed by over 3 months), the operators often sell at high prices, leading miners to face a "coin price halved + output halved" double whammy, turning their machines into overpriced scrap metal.

In May 2021, Chia caused a global shortage of hard drives. At that time, the XCH price soared to $1,600, and the static payback period for early hard drive investments was once compressed to under 130 days. This extreme profit triggered a tsunami of global storage computing power. However, the ensuing "scissors difference" was brutal: despite the price drop, the hard drives ordered earlier continued to come online, and the total network hashrate still surged after the price peak, extending the payback period from 30 days to over 3,000 days.

Observing the data of the IceRiver KS1 mining machine, in mid-2023, its payback period once dropped to 150 days. Unlike Chia, KAS's price even maintained an upward trend. Yet, miners still faced losses because the rate of hashrate growth far exceeded the rate of price increase. The rapid iteration and large-scale deployment of industrial-grade ASICs caused the total network difficulty to rise exponentially. Despite the price remaining strong, the payback period for the KS1 machine irreversibly soared to 3,500 days due to the skyrocketing difficulty.

ZEC's Hashrate Level is in a Historically Dangerous Zone for 51% Attacks

Beyond the mining economic model, another decisive risk line is the network's security and hashrate scale. For PoW chains, the "total network hashrate scale + 51% attack cost" directly determines whether it can remain self-consistent at a high valuation.

1) Total Network Hashrate Scale: Equivalent to a Small to Medium-Sized Bitcoin Mining Farm

According to the latest network data, ZEC's total network hashrate is approximately 12.48 GSol/s. Based on a Z15 Pro's hashrate of 0.00084 GSol/s, only about 14,857 Z15 Pro mining machines are needed, with corresponding energy consumption around 40 MW, which is equivalent to the scale of a small to medium-sized Bitcoin mining farm.

From the perspective of the entire network's hashrate scale, Zcash's security foundation appears extremely weak, having entered the risk zone of many small PoW chains that have previously been successfully attacked by 51%.

https://miningpoolstats.stream/zcash

2) Attack Cost: Theoretical Cost in the Millions of Dollars

Generally, initiating a 51% attack requires controlling over 50% of the total network hashrate at the same time. If nearly 16,000 Z15 Pros can form the main force for ZEC, then an attacker would only need to rent or purchase a few thousand devices to potentially control over 50% of the hashrate.

A rough estimate:

Each Z15 Pro futures cost ~$5,000, and generally, purchasing over 300 units constitutes a large customer order, which can enjoy at least a 10% discount.
Controlling hashrate of ~8,000 units → Cost at most ~$40M, with the energy consumption required for the attack around 20 MW.
If renting or second-hand prices are lower, the actual startup cost could be in the millions of dollars.

On a public chain with an FDV nearing $10 billion, a potential chain reorganization or double-spending could be initiated with an investment of just a few million in hashrate, which itself is a structural risk that cannot be ignored.

3) Comparison with Mainstream Chains: Huge Security Gap

To provide a clearer perception, let’s make a simple comparison with other large PoW chains currently in operation:

More critically, ZEC's current hashrate is not only far below mainstream PoW chains like BTC/LTC/KAS, but even chains like ETC, BTG, VTC, and BSV, which have previously been successfully attacked by 51%, had higher hashrates during their attacks than the current ZEC, indicating that ZEC's network security has effectively fallen into a dangerous zone where it can be attacked.

On-Chain Data Reveals that ZCash's Actual Usage Remains Very Limited

Despite the recent rise in the ZEC narrative, on-chain data provides a more rational perspective—there is a significant deviation between actual usage and the current multi-billion FDV.

From transaction volume, active addresses to ecosystem scale, Zcash's actual network activity is far from the prosperity implied by the price trend:

The average daily transactions over the past month were only 15,000 – 18,000 transactions/day, merely 1% – 2% of large public chains.
As a privacy chain, the vast majority of transactions are still transparent, with shielded transactions accounting for less than 10%.

https://zechub.wiki/dashboard

Repricing When the Market Returns from Frenzy to Calm

Narratives, sentiment, celebrity effects, and mining machine economic traps have collectively pushed an eight-year-old dormant project to the peak of public opinion. However, beneath the bustling surface, when we truly return to the three core aspects of blockchain: economic sustainability, network security, and on-chain adoption, ZEC presents a starkly contrasting picture.

This is:

A mining environment with a payback period of only 105 days and an annualized return of 350%.
A hashrate scale equivalent to a medium-sized Bitcoin mining farm, with a 51% attack cost as low as the million-dollar level, transaction volume only 1%–2% of mainstream public chains, and actual usage of privacy features accounting for less than 10% of a PoW chain.

History has proven countless times: extremely short payback periods (super high ROI) are often precursors to mining disasters and price crashes.

Whether ZEC will be an exception, I cannot assert.

But the rules of the crypto world have never changed: narratives and sentiment can create myths, while fundamentals determine how far those myths can go.

End.

*Special thanks to @0x010crypto and @0xTZ_DeFi for their contributions.

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