Aztec Labs has relaunched zk.money, a self-custodial wallet designed to make stablecoin payments private on Aztec Network, its privacy-focused Ethereum layer-2. The service returns three years after the original wallet was discontinued, with lower transaction limits during its initial rollout.
Private payments, visible deposits
zk.money allows users to claim a tag such as bob.zk.money. The tag is resolved through the Ethereum Name Service, or ENS, to a deposit address, allowing users to send and receive supported stablecoins without publicly revealing their balances, payment amounts or recipients in transactions conducted within the wallet.
The privacy protection is not comprehensive. Deposits sent from Ethereum remain visible on-chain, while transfers made inside zk.money are kept private. Users can fund the wallet with USDC, USDT or DAI from an exchange or an Ethereum wallet.
Aztec Network is a separate layer-2 network that settles back to Ethereum. According to Aztec’s developer documentation, private functions run on a user’s own device, which generates zero-knowledge proofs. These cryptographic proofs demonstrate that a transaction is valid without disclosing its underlying details.
Limits and self-custody
The relaunch begins with restrictions intended to limit transaction sizes and deposits. Individual transactions are capped at $2,500, and all users share a daily deposit limit of $50,000.
The wallet is self-custodial, meaning users retain control of their funds. Aztec says it cannot spend or freeze those funds, and that no privileged administrator controls the system.
The original zk.money launched in 2021 and, according to Aztec Labs, attracted more than 75,000 wallets and processed $100 million in volume before the team shut it down to focus on building its own network. Aztec raised $17 million in a 2021 funding round led by Paradigm and later expanded zk.money with Aztec Connect, a toolkit intended to connect its privacy technology with decentralized-finance protocols.
Privacy returns to Ethereum’s agenda
The relaunch arrives as privacy becomes a more prominent topic for Ethereum developers. Proposals being considered for next year’s Hegotá upgrade could allow privacy pools to pay their own transaction fees without intermediaries.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin also wrote in a post over the weekend that specialized applications could achieve “very strong privacy” through zero-knowledge proofs as part of his vision for a “cryptographic world computer.”
According to Decrypt, Aztec Labs CEO Joe Andrews said blockchain transactions between individuals should not require people to publish their financial history. The relaunch places that argument into a live wallet, while its public deposits and early transaction ceilings show the practical boundaries of the service’s privacy model.
Current crypto market picture
Moneyiar market data at 09:33-09:34 on October 1, 2026, showed Ethereum at $2,696.9104700599, up 0.02% over 24 hours and 2.16% over seven days. Cardano was $0.2474857805, down 0.3% in 24 hours and up 5.79% over seven days. Shiba Inu stood at $0.00000575, down 1.09% over 24 hours and up 3.05% over seven days, while Uniswap was $9.0877019562, up 2.52% and 2.95% over those periods, respectively.
