Zerocash is a new cryptocurrency protocol that provides total privacy to its users. An enhanced version of the previous Zerocoin, it now allows full cryptocurrency usability.
The network should go live in the months ahead.
I strongly suggest that you read the material published here. It’s a great journey into the power of cryptography.
Anyhow, from an investment perspective, the new coin seems also promising.
Its value proposition is strong. Total anonymity of digital transactions. Every Zerocash protocol user will be able to spend any amount of money without leaking information to third parties. Not the sending address, not the receiving address, not the value of the payment.
Its developer team are world-class cryptographers.
Due to smart implementations of the complex cryptography involved, transactions are light-weight and blocks will be confirmed in six minutes.
A healthy community is gathering around the coin.
Zerocoins (the currency native to the Zerocash protocol) can be minted out of bitcoins and bitcoin can be extracted back from zerocoins.
All the above give me no fear about technical issues arising once the network goes live.
Then comes the big point. Due to guaranteed total anonymity of digital transactions over the Zerocash network, it is easy to imagine the main use the market will have for this coin: dark web purchases of illicit goods.
Even in the global market cap of dark web illicit trade is difficult to estimate, already published research shows that the now defunct Silk Road made revenues of about $ 1.2 billion/year. The same research also shows that dark web black markets activity grew in the years following the Silk Road bust.
So, there is a potential huge demand for this new currency, both by vendors and by consumers of illicit goods trading on the dark web. The transition to the new currency could also be quite simple, since all people involved are already familiar with digital currency.
So, from an investment standpoint all pieces seem in place for a healthy profit. The only problem will be actually getting the coins. Since no ICO is scheduled on Zerocash, the only viable option for early adoption is mining. Luckily, news coming out of the Zerocash forum indicate no existing ASICs could be converted profitably to mine zerocoins. This gives the small, tech-savvy investor a good chance to arrange a CPU/GPU mining operation to get some coins early.