Zcash Gets First European ETP as 21Shares Lists Fund in Paris and Amsterdam
by Maisie Morrison · BlockonomiTLDR
Table of Contents
- 21Shares listed Europe’s first Zcash exchange-traded product on Euronext Paris and Amsterdam on Sept. 22.
- The physically backed fund charges a 2.5% annual fee and uses BitGo as its custodian.
- The fund launched with about $100,000 in assets and a net asset value of $20.04 per unit.
- Zcash hit an intraday high near $1,680 on Wednesday before falling about 6.6% to roughly $1,522.
- Grayscale’s US Zcash ETF holds close to $890 million and completes a 3-for-1 share split on Sept. 30.
21Shares has listed Europe’s first Zcash exchange-traded product. The fund began trading on Euronext Paris and Euronext Amsterdam on Sept. 22.
The product charges a 2.5% annual management fee. That is higher than what most Bitcoin and Ether products charge on the same exchanges.
21Shares also listed a second product on the same day. It tracks ETHFI, the governance token of the restaking protocol ether.fi, and carries the same fee.
How the New Zcash Fund Works
Both funds are physically backed. This means they hold the actual tokens with institutional custodians instead of tracking futures contracts.
21Shares named BitGo as the custodian for the Zcash product. The fund trades in euros in Paris and in dollars in Amsterdam.
The fund started small. It had 5,000 securities outstanding, a net asset value of $20.04 per unit, and about $100,000 in assets on its first day, according to the 21Shares factsheet.
The product lets investors buy Zcash exposure through a regular brokerage account. They do not need to open a crypto exchange account or manage private keys.
Losing private keys can mean losing coins for good. The fund avoids that risk, but its fee also covers custody of an asset that custodians handle less often than Bitcoin or Ether.
Zcash is a privacy coin. Users can shield their balances and transfers, while Bitcoin and Ethereum are transparent by default.
Zcash is built on Bitcoin’s code. It keeps the 21 million coin cap, proof-of-work mining and halving schedule, but adds optional shielded transactions that hide the sender, receiver and amount.
Last week, coinholders voted 98.9% to keep the Bitcoin-style halving model. The other option was a smoother issuance schedule.
Zcash Price and Grayscale ETF
Zcash has gained more than 2,700% this year. The token pushed past $1,600 after the listing on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, it hit an intraday high near $1,680. It then fell back to about $1,522, a drop of about 6.6% on the day.
Zcash has a market value near $27.5 billion. That makes it the ninth-largest crypto asset.
The European listing follows Grayscale’s Zcash ETF, which launched Aug. 25 on NYSE Arca. Grayscale converted its nine-year-old Zcash Trust into the ETF.
The Grayscale fund has pulled in more than $233 million and holds close to $890 million in assets. It will complete a 3-for-1 share split on Sept. 30.