Zcash
Zcash co-founder Sean Bowe has proposed ending automatic funding for the Zcash Community Grants program, arguing that its existing treasury is already large enough to cover years of expenses. The proposal would stop the program from receiving its remaining 8% share of newly issued ZEC and redirect that allocation to the Network Sustainability Mechanism, which is designed to support future mining rewards.
Under the plan, the grants committee would retain its current assets and continue funding projects from its existing reserves. Bowe estimates that approximately $125 million would remain after accounting for outstanding grant commitments, assuming a ZEC price of $1,300. In his view, continuing to add funds automatically is difficult to justify when the program already holds substantially more capital than it currently needs to operate.
ZCG is managed by a five-member committee responsible for selecting and approving grants. A separate funding program receives 12% of newly issued ZEC and allows holders to vote on grant allocations every quarter, subject to participation and approval requirements. Bowe wants to preserve this larger allocation while ending the automatic funding stream for ZCG, with the redirected funds remaining in the sustainability mechanism for the rest of the current funding term.
The scale of the treasury is central to the proposal. The committee’s reported holdings include approximately 91,453 ZEC and $8.8 million, while around $2.4 million has been committed to grant recipients. At the network’s target issuance rate, the program receives roughly 144 ZEC per day. Based on the price assumptions used in the proposal, that translates into an estimated $68 million in annual funding.
By comparison, the Financial Privacy Foundation, which administers the program’s funds, reported slightly more than $1.5 million in expenses for the first quarter. At that pace, annual expenses would be approximately $6 million, far below the estimated annual inflow. This gap has strengthened the argument that the current funding structure may be generating reserves faster than the program can reasonably deploy them.
The treasury’s long-term purchasing power will still depend on ZEC’s market price and future spending. Bowe estimates that even at $500 per ZEC, the existing reserves could cover approximately five years of expenses, assuming annual spending of $10 million. The proposal would therefore prioritize using the capital already accumulated instead of continuing to increase the treasury through automatic allocations.
The funding debate has also drawn attention to the use of grants for outreach initiatives. One ZCG-funded project, ZECsy, requested $550,000 for activities focused on adult-industry events, cryptocurrency conferences and workshops. Its stated objective is to help people who face banking restrictions accept payments while protecting their personal financial information. The committee approved startup funding and the first nine milestones, totaling approximately $461,500.
The discussion raises broader questions about how Zcash should manage its community funding, evaluate grant performance and protect resources over the long term. Ending automatic allocations would not eliminate the grants program; instead, it would make future spending more dependent on the reserves already available. The central issue is whether maintaining a large and continuously growing treasury remains necessary when current funding appears to exceed the program’s operating needs.
