How Zcash and NEAR Are Driving This Crypto Bull Run
Unchained | Sep 23 2026 | 00:56:06
Zcash and NEAR are both ripping this week, and Illia Polosukhin and Mert Mumtaz say privacy is the reason why. Is this how the “Bitcoin DeFi” vision comes true?
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Zcash just cracked the top 10 on CoinGecko, up 32% in a week and near an all-time high. NEAR is up 69% over the same stretch, and both rallies trace back to the same catalyst: transactions nobody else can see.
Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR Protocol, and Mert Mumtaz, co-founder and CEO of Helius, join Laura Shin to unpack why confidential transactions, not speculation, are driving the rally, and why the two networks now function as one privacy-preserving liquidity layer for real businesses and institutions, not just traders.
They cover NEAR Intents' $260 million in TVL, the multi-party computation and secure enclaves behind NEAR's confidential balances versus Zcash's zero-knowledge shielded pool, the counterfeiting bug that forced Zcash's Ironwood migration, and NEAR's Shield system, which halted transactions mid-hack during a Litecoin exploit. Zcash's next upgrade, Project Tachyon, aims to make the network quantum-proof and scale it 100x, and Mert argues privacy will not stay a competitive edge for long.
Host:
Laura Shin, Host / Unchained
Guest:
Illia Polosukhin - Co-Founder of NEAR Protocol
Mert Mumtaz - Cofounder and CEO of Helius
Timestamps
🚀 01:39 Guest intros, plus why ZEC (+32%) and NEAR (+69%) are ripping this week
🌐 03:13 Illia and Mert on why NEAR and ZEC's price action is turning heads
🟠 08:34 Is Zcash and NEAR the Bitcoin DeFi dream, minus Bitcoin?
🕵️ 11:54 Why coffee-shop-level balance visibility is a real business risk
✈️ 15:06 Mert's travel hack: booking flights and hotels privately via NEAR Intents
🧠 18:12 Why privacy is a retention tool first, not just an onboarding one
📣 25:11 1inch Aqua: back multiple liquidity positions with one wallet balance at http://unchainedcrypto.com/go/1inch-yt
🔐 26:23 Privacy vs confidentiality: ZK proofs versus NEAR's MPC-and-enclave model
🛡️ 29:26 Inside NEAR's secure enclaves, and why store-of-value needs real privacy
🔄 33:59 How a NEAR Intents swap settles across chains, and its $206 million in TVL
🐛 39:09 The Zcash counterfeit bug, the Ironwood migration, and formal verification
🤖 45:49 How NEAR's Shield AI system and MPC guardrails manage solver risk
⚡ 51:33 Zcash's NU7 upgrade: faster blocks, quantum-proofing, and private voting
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========================================================
Thank you to our sponsor!
Visit 1inch.com to swap tokenized securities, crypto and more. Simple. Secure. Self-custodial. Whatever asset you’re buying - swap it at 1inch.com
========================================================
Quick favor: We're deciding what Unchained does next; new shows, stream times, what's worth paying for. Our listener survey takes five minutes, it's anonymous, and I read the write-in answers myself. Everyone who takes it can enter a drawing for a free year of Unchained Premium or Bits + Bips Premium. Open through Sunday, October 18.
— Laura
========================================================
Zcash just cracked the top 10 on CoinGecko, up 32% in a week and near an all-time high. NEAR is up 69% over the same stretch, and both rallies trace back to the same catalyst: transactions nobody else can see.
Illia Polosukhin, co-founder of NEAR Protocol, and Mert Mumtaz, co-founder and CEO of Helius, join Laura Shin to unpack why confidential transactions, not speculation, are driving the rally, and why the two networks now function as one privacy-preserving liquidity layer for real businesses and institutions, not just traders.
They cover NEAR Intents' $260 million in TVL, the multi-party computation and secure enclaves behind NEAR's confidential balances versus Zcash's zero-knowledge shielded pool, the counterfeiting bug that forced Zcash's Ironwood migration, and NEAR's Shield system, which halted transactions mid-hack during a Litecoin exploit. Zcash's next upgrade, Project Tachyon, aims to make the network quantum-proof and scale it 100x, and Mert argues privacy will not stay a competitive edge for long.
Host:
Laura Shin, Host / Unchained
Guest:
Illia Polosukhin - Co-Founder of NEAR Protocol
Mert Mumtaz - Cofounder and CEO of Helius
Timestamps
🚀 01:39 Guest intros, plus why ZEC (+32%) and NEAR (+69%) are ripping this week
🌐 03:13 Illia and Mert on why NEAR and ZEC's price action is turning heads
🟠 08:34 Is Zcash and NEAR the Bitcoin DeFi dream, minus Bitcoin?
🕵️ 11:54 Why coffee-shop-level balance visibility is a real business risk
✈️ 15:06 Mert's travel hack: booking flights and hotels privately via NEAR Intents
🧠 18:12 Why privacy is a retention tool first, not just an onboarding one
📣 25:11 1inch Aqua: back multiple liquidity positions with one wallet balance at http://unchainedcrypto.com/go/1inch-yt
🔐 26:23 Privacy vs confidentiality: ZK proofs versus NEAR's MPC-and-enclave model
🛡️ 29:26 Inside NEAR's secure enclaves, and why store-of-value needs real privacy
🔄 33:59 How a NEAR Intents swap settles across chains, and its $206 million in TVL
🐛 39:09 The Zcash counterfeit bug, the Ironwood migration, and formal verification
🤖 45:49 How NEAR's Shield AI system and MPC guardrails manage solver risk
⚡ 51:33 Zcash's NU7 upgrade: faster blocks, quantum-proofing, and private voting
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices