Zcash drops 11 percent as a dispute over ZCG grant money precedes the NU7 upgrade

Zcash (ZEC) has lost around 11 percent over the past 24 hours and was trading at about $1,135 on Tuesday morning, roughly €1,014. Two developments are colliding: a large buyer had his leveraged position closed out by stop-loss orders, and inside the Zcash community the dispute over who controls the grant pool of Zcash Community Grants (ZCG), worth around 91,500 ZEC, is escalating. On top of that, the NU7 network upgrade is less than three days away.

Anyone holding ZEC or thinking of buying it therefore needs to keep three things apart: short-term selling pressure from closed-out positions, a fundamental dispute over how development is funded, and a technical switchover tied to a fixed block. This article puts all three into context with figures and shows what you should keep in mind on buying, custody and tax in Germany.

Zcash price falls to $1,135: the figures from November 3

On the morning of November 3, 2026, ZEC stood at $1,134.67. The high of the past 24 hours was $1,278.55, the low $1,127.88. Over seven days the loss is a little more than 7 percent, over 30 days a little more than 13 percent. Market capitalisation is around $19.3 billion, which puts Zcash in 11th place among the largest cryptocurrencies. Tokens worth just under $887 million changed hands in 24 hours.

The gap to the rest of the market stands out. The two largest cryptocurrencies each gave up only around 2 percent over the same period, and the other major privacy coin was practically unchanged. The fall in ZEC is therefore not a general sell-off; its causes lie within the project itself.

Zcash had already lost 7.4 percent within a single day on October 30. Back then the focus was the cut-off date for old Sprout balances, which we explained in our article on the Zcash price drop ahead of the NU7 deadline. This time a concrete liquidation and the dispute over grant money come on top.

Zcash whale liquidation: $5.84 million lost in four days

The most tangible trigger was described by on-chain analyst Ember, whose findings the news site TechFlow reported on on November 3. According to Ember, a single address bought 25,002 ZEC over four days for 31.78 million USDT, an average of roughly $1,271 per token. At the current price that amounts to a paper loss of about $3.26 million.

At the same time, the same party held a long position of 18,910 ZEC on the derivatives platform Hyperliquid, opened at $1,378. When ZEC fell below $1,200 overnight, stop-loss orders closed the entire position. According to Ember, the realised loss was around $2.58 million, which together with the spot holding comes to about $5.84 million.

A long position is a bet on rising prices, usually made with borrowed capital. A stop-loss is a sell order placed in advance that triggers automatically once a price level is reached. When many such orders sit at the same round number, they all sell at once into a market that is already falling. The case at $1,200 shows exactly this pattern.

ZCG grant pool: what the $124 million Zcash dispute is about

Zcash Community Grants is a committee of five people that funds development and community projects around Zcash. The pool is fed automatically: a fixed share of 8 percent of every newly issued block reward goes to ZCG. As long as ZEC cost a few dollars, that was a modest budget. With the price rally of recent months it has turned into a fortune.

According to a report by Cointelegraph on October 30, the pool holds around 91,500 ZEC. ZCG proposed handing 36,200 ZEC of that, then worth about $46 million, to the Network Sustainability Mechanism and keeping around 55,200 ZEC. In addition, the committee wants to forgo some 62,000 ZEC of future allocations. Together that would be around 98,000 ZEC, or about $124 million, that would later go to miners as rewards.

For the critics, that is not enough. Mert Mumtaz, co-founder of infrastructure provider Helius, called the proposal “nowhere near good enough”, according to Cointelegraph, and demanded that spending be accountable to ZEC holders. Gemini co-founder Tyler Winklevoss publicly questioned whether the committee is fit to manage $110 million. Zcash co-founder Sean Bowe had earlier proposed ending the automatic 8 percent share altogether.

Large holder “big z” and the ZEC sale: an announcement without on-chain proof

Over the weekend a large holder going by the pseudonym “big z” joined the debate. According to reports from several industry sites, he announced on X that he would sell all of his ZEC. His objection is that the pool also funds projects beyond cryptography, such as a programme to spread Zcash among people without access to banking.

Whether he actually sold, and how much, is unclear. The reports name neither his holdings nor an address through which sales could be traced. Whether the buying address in Ember’s analysis is connected to “big z” is not established either. For the assessment, that means the announcement explains the mood, but it does not on its own explain the price drop.

More solid is the mechanism the case exposes. At Zcash, a small committee decides over a nine-figure sum without holders voting on it. As long as this conflict remains open, the price reacts sensitively to every statement by large holders. According to Cointelegraph, a formal proposal from ZCG is still to follow; no date for a decision is known.

Network Sustainability Mechanism: where the 98,000 ZEC are meant to go

The Network Sustainability Mechanism, or NSM, is a reserve within the protocol. ZEC that flow into it are temporarily removed from circulation and paid out to miners as block rewards over many years. For holders, this works much like a scarcity effect stretched over time: supply that could reach the market today is pushed into the future.

According to Cointelegraph, the automatic allocation to ZCG ends in 2028 as things stand. The committee’s compromise would extend reduced funding until the block reward halving in 2032. Critics see this more as an extension than a sacrifice. How the vote on this question turns out will help decide how much new ZEC can actually be sold in the coming years.

NU7 upgrade at block 3,543,405: activation in the early hours of November 6

Independently of the grants dispute, the countdown to the NU7 network upgrade is running. A network upgrade at Zcash is a change to the consensus rules that applies to all nodes from a set block height onwards. NU7 shortens the interval between two blocks from 75 to 25 seconds, switches off older version 4 transactions and introduces the Network Sustainability Mechanism. Daily issuance of ZEC stays the same because the reward per block falls accordingly. We described the details in our article on the block time change under NU7.

The developers named November 5 as the target. What counts, however, is block height 3,543,405, not the date. On the morning of November 3 the blockchain stood at block 3,540,076. That leaves 3,329 blocks until activation. At 75 seconds per block, that is a little over 69 hours, so by this calculation the switchover falls in the early morning of November 6, German time. If the block pace varies, the timing shifts by a few hours. cryptoticker.io compiled this analysis itself on November 3, 2026.

Sprout balances and exchange pauses: who the NU7 upgrade affects directly

For most investors in Germany, NU7 changes little day to day. If your ZEC sit on a trading platform, the provider takes care of the switchover. Exchanges usually halt deposits and withdrawals of a cryptocurrency for a few hours around an upgrade. So do not plan transfers for the night before November 6.

It is different if you hold ZEC yourself and still have balances in Zcash’s oldest shielded area, the so-called Sprout pool. Once version 4 transactions are switched off, these coins can no longer be moved after the upgrade. Anyone with an old wallet from the early years should move those balances into a current pool before the block. For new holdings a current wallet is the better choice, and if in doubt a hardware wallet that supports Zcash. Which devices can do that is shown in our hardware wallet comparison.

Buying Zcash in Germany: MiCA licence, holding period and custody

If you want to buy in after the pullback, check the route first. Since the transition periods ended, crypto service providers in the EU need a licence under the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA). An overview of providers with this authorisation is in our comparison of regulated crypto exchanges. Not every platform lists privacy coins such as Zcash, so a look at the coin list before signing up saves time.

For tax purposes, ZEC is treated like other cryptocurrencies. In Germany, a profitable sale is tax-free after a holding period of more than one year; before that it counts as a private disposal. Gains from such transactions remain tax-free up to an exemption limit of €1,000 a year. Anyone selling now to limit losses can offset those losses against gains from other private disposals, provided the purchase date and purchase price are documented. A crypto tax tool makes that record-keeping considerably easier.

Leverage and liquidation in ZEC: the stop-loss at $1,200 cost $2.58 million

The whale’s case shows on a small scale why leveraged positions are especially risky in a coin with an unsettled news situation. The long position was opened at $1,378; on the morning of November 3 the price was around 18 percent lower. At five times leverage, a 20 percent fall mathematically wipes out the capital put up, and the platform closes the position even earlier because of its safety margin.

A liquidation is the forced closing of a leveraged position as soon as the deposited capital no longer covers the losses. A stop-loss limits the damage but does not protect against price gaps: if the price falls quickly through the level, the sale happens at the next available price. Anyone trading ZEC via derivatives should choose leverage so that a daily loss like the current 11 percent does not end the position. The comparison further up shows on which platforms perpetual futures can be traded with clear fees.

Zcash price levels: daily low at $1,128, above that $1,200 and $1,279

Three levels follow directly from the day’s data. On the downside, the 24-hour low of $1,127.88 is the first reference point. If ZEC falls below it, the downward momentum continues, and the next round number is $1,100.

On the upside, $1,200 is the threshold at which the stop-loss orders were triggered overnight. A move back above it would at least partly ease the liquidation pressure. Above that lies the daily high of $1,278.55. Only above this zone would this week’s setback be recovered. Analysts’ price targets for ZEC are collected on our Zcash price prediction page.

Zcash grants dispute: around 69 hours remain until the NU7 block

There is little time left until NU7 activates, and the dispute over the ZCG pool will not be over with the upgrade. Three steps help you get prepared:

1. Secure your buying route: Check whether your platform has a MiCA licence and trades ZEC. The overview of regulated crypto exchanges lists licensed providers.
2. Review custody: If your ZEC sit in an old wallet, move Sprout balances before block 3,543,405 and choose a current solution for new holdings from the hardware wallet comparison.
3. Record your tax data: Document the purchase date and price of every ZEC position so that the one-year period and any loss offsets can be proven. Suitable tools are listed among the crypto tax tools.

(As of November 3, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)