Original Title: "Bitget Wallet Research Institute: After a 1460% Surge, Reassessing the Value Foundation of ZEC"
Original Author: Lacie Zhang, Researcher at Bitget Wallet
The Beginning of a Myth, the Prelude to Collapse
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 peak of $730, the increase has reached an astonishing 1460%, with the FDV soaring to a historical peak of $13B in 8 years.
What has further heightened the sentiment is the support from numerous top figures: endorsements from heavyweight personalities like @naval, @0xMert_, and @CryptoHayes have 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, with Privacy seemingly being hailed once again 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? The Bitget Wallet Research Institute will explore this in detail in this article.
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 provide the most intuitive reflection of the chain's value capture ability.
Let’s first calculate ZEC's current payback period:
1) Z15 Pro: The Most Mainstream Mining Machine
The most discussed and sought-after flagship ZEC mining machine currently 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 Ratio: 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.
2) ZEC's Hashrate and Mining Revenue: Astonishing Daily Earnings
In the past two months, ZEC's high returns have rapidly attracted mining power, 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 away from a sideways trend at the end of September, while hashrate (light purple) and difficulty (dark blue) also saw a simultaneous increase. This trend indicates that the mining side has begun to respond to the price increase.
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: 1.5625 ZEC
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 Electricity Consumption: $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 are nearly $60 per day! Historical data shows that such high earnings have persisted for at least a week.
3) Payback Period: Extremely Rare High ROI
Assuming that network difficulty remains stable in the short term and electricity costs are steady, we calculate the payback period using the Z15 Pro futures price of $4,999.
To reflect real costs, we amortize the mining machine over 5 years (1826 days):
• Daily Machine Cost Amortization: $2.74
• Daily Net Earnings After Amortization: Approximately $56.04
Thus, the static payback period for a Z15 Pro is only about 89 days, translating to an annualized return rate of up to 410%.
This figure is extremely rare in the entire history of PoW—one could even say it is anomalous:
• The payback period for BTC mining machine uptrends typically ranges from 12 to 24 months.
• The ROI for ETH during the PoW era was between 300 to 600 days.
• Any PoW project with a payback period of less than 120 days (such as FIL, XCH, RVN, etc.) has almost always experienced a surge followed by a collapse.
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 a premium price when the coin price is at its highest 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 more than 3 months), the market makers often sell at high prices, leading miners to face a double whammy of "coin price halving + output halving," turning their mining machines into overpriced scrap metal.
• In May 2021, Chia caused a global shortage of hard drives. At that time, the price of XCH soared to $1,600, and the static payback period for early hard drive investments was once compressed to less than 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 continued to surge after the coin price peaked, with the payback period rapidly extending 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, the price of KAS even maintained an upward trend. Yet even so, 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 led to an exponential rise in network difficulty. Despite the price remaining strong, the payback period for the KS1 machine irreversibly soared to 3,500 days.
ZEC's Hashrate Level is in a Danger Zone Frequently Targeted by 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 + 51% attack cost" directly determines whether it can remain self-consistent at a high valuation.
1) Total Network Hashrate: Equivalent to a Small to Medium-Sized Bitcoin Mining Farm
As of the time of writing, ZEC's total network hashrate is approximately 13.31 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 at around 40 MW, which is only 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%.
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 thousands of 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 can be initiated with an investment of just a few million dollars 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 in operation:
More critically, ZEC's current hashrate is not only far below that of mainstream PoW chains like BTC, LTC, and KAS, but even lower than that of chains like ETC, BTG, VTC, and BSV, which have previously been successfully attacked by 51%. This indicates that ZEC's network security has effectively fallen into a vulnerable attack zone.
On-Chain Data Reveals ZCash's Actual Usage Remains Very Limited
Despite the recent rise in the ZEC narrative, on-chain data provides a more sober perspective—there is a significant divergence 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, accounting for just 1% – 2% of large public chains.
• As a privacy chain, the vast majority of transactions remain transparent, with shielded transactions accounting for less than 10%.
Repricing When the Market Returns from Frenzy to Calm
Narratives, emotions, 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 89 days and an annualized return of 410%.
• A hashrate scale equivalent to a medium-sized Bitcoin mining farm, with a 51% attack cost as low as a few million dollars, transaction volume and daily active users only accounting for 1%–2% of mainstream public chains, and actual usage of privacy features being less than 10% on a PoW chain.
History has repeatedly proven: 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 emotions can create myths, while fundamentals determine how far those myths can go.
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