What happened
Zcash closed at $642. 18 on May 9, 2026, according to the price data cited by Crypto. News in its Tuesday piece.
The print is the highest ZEC has traded since the 2017 cycle high and marks the top of a rally that the publication measured at between 650% and 1,000% from the token's 2024 lows. On a market-cap basis, the move pushed Zcash above Monero, the privacy coin that had ranked first in the category for nearly the entire history of the sector. Crypto.
News did not specify the exact crossover date, only that Zcash now sits at the top of the privacy-coin league table. The piece, titled 'Zcash price prediction 2026-2030: the privacy renaissance test,' framed the question as whether the rally reflects a structural shift in demand for on-chain privacy or a positioning squeeze that will mean-revert.
Why it matters
Monero's hold on the privacy-coin crown was one of the longer-running rankings in crypto. XMR's lead survived the 2018 bear market, the 2021 mania, and the 2022 wipeout. Losing it to Zcash is a regime change, not a rotation.
The rally also lands against a different regulatory backdrop than the 2017 cycle. Major exchanges spent 2023 and 2024 delisting privacy assets in Europe and parts of Asia, citing the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets framework and the FATF travel rule. ZEC's run to $642 came despite that exchange shrinkage, which is the part that makes the move interesting to desks.
If listings are narrower and volume is still bidding, the marginal buyer has changed. The Crypto. News framing - a 'renaissance test' - is the right one.