Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss have filed paperwork with U.S. regulators to launch a spot exchange-traded fund for Zcash, adding another proposed investment vehicle to a growing institutional push around the privacy-focused cryptocurrency.
According to Decrypt, the proposed fund is described in an S-1 registration statement submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission. If approved, it would hold Zcash directly and aim to track the market price of ZEC. The ETF would trade on Nasdaq under the ticker “WINK,” allowing investors to gain exposure through a conventional brokerage account instead of purchasing and storing the cryptocurrency themselves.
What the proposed WINK ETF would do
The fund would charge a sponsor fee of 0.25%. Gemini, the crypto exchange founded by the Winklevoss twins, would act as custodian and hold the trust’s ZEC in cold storage, a form of offline custody intended to reduce exposure to online attacks.
Winklevoss Capital Fund has also indicated that it may purchase as much as $100 million of the ETF’s shares. The filing characterizes that indication as non-binding, meaning it does not represent a firm obligation to invest that amount.
Cypherpunk Technologies, a Zcash treasury company backed by the Winklevoss twins, would serve as the fund’s “Zcash Ecosystem Partner.” In that role, it would advise on protocol matters and coinholder voting.
Zcash’s renewed appeal
The filing comes as Zcash has moved from being widely viewed as a regulatory outlier toward receiving more institutional attention. Zcash is a privacy coin: its technology can use cryptography known as zk-SNARKs to shield a transaction’s sender, recipient and amount.
That privacy feature has helped define the project, but it has also created distinctive regulatory and technical concerns. The recent revival in interest has been accompanied by new investment products. Grayscale converted its Zcash Trust into a spot ETF in August and later split its shares, while 21Shares launched Europe’s first Zcash exchange-traded product.
A WINK listing would add the Winklevoss twins’ name and their associated crypto businesses to that expanding group of products and services linked to ZEC.
Risks and approval process
The S-1 is an initial regulatory filing, not approval to begin trading. The SEC must still review and authorize the fund before a listing can proceed.
The filing highlights ZEC’s extreme price volatility and risks specific to privacy-focused networks. It points to a soundness bug discovered this year in Zcash’s Orchard shielded pool. The issue briefly pushed ZEC down by roughly 50% before the network addressed it through the Ironwood upgrade.
A spot crypto ETF gives investors a regulated market wrapper, but it does not remove the volatility of the underlying asset. The filing says ZEC has risen by more than 2,000% over the past year, underscoring both the scale of its rebound and the potential for large price swings.
Current Zcash market picture
Moneyiar market data at 10:29 a.m. on October 7, 2026, showed Zcash at $1,322.1649264674. ZEC was down 3.07% over 24 hours and 6.52% over seven days.
