Zcash Founder Dismisses Hidden ZEC Supply Fears

Zcash co-founder Zooko Wilcox has pushed back against concerns over undisclosed $ZEC inflation, stating that the current supply stands at exactly 16,848,458 ZEC and is fully verifiable by anyone who wants to check it. He added that independent confirmation does not require months or years of waiting and can be done on a local computer.

The Background: Orchard Vulnerability Shook Confidence

The remarks come after a turbulent stretch for Zcash. The vulnerability was discovered on May 29, 2026, by security researcher Taylor Hornby, contracted by Shielded Labs, using an AI-assisted auditing framework with Anthropic's Opus 4.8 model. The issue resided in the elliptic-curve components of the Halo 2 proving system used for Orchard transactions and could theoretically have permitted the undetectable creation of counterfeit notes inside the private pool. Because Orchard transactions conceal amounts and participants, cryptographic methods alone could not definitively confirm whether the flaw had been exploited prior to remediation.

According to the Zcash Foundation, there is no evidence of exploitation or unauthorized value creation. ZEC experienced an intraday drop of roughly 37%, then recovered much of the loss, per market reports.

Ironwood: Building Toward Verifiable Supply

The core concern was not whether the vulnerability had been fixed, but that the network could not prove the flaw was never exploited in the four years it existed, casting doubt on supply credibility.

Zcash has activated its Ironwood (NU6.3) upgrade, sealing the Orchard shielded pool that held about 3.66 million ZEC and opening a new private pool that starts with zero coins. Ironwood's main supply safeguard is a turnstile between Orchard and the new pool. After activation, Orchard stopped accepting new outputs and internal transactions. Funds can move out, but the accounting rule prevents more ZEC from leaving Orchard than the amount that legitimately entered it.

A machine-checked mathematical proof consisting of more than 2,700 theorems confirms Ironwood cannot create undetectable counterfeit ZEC under its design assumptions. Project Tachyon is running formal verification on the new Ironwood circuits to produce machine-checked proofs in addition to manual review. If completed at scale, it would be the first formal proof of this kind for a deployed shielded pool.

Wilcox's latest comments reinforce the same message: the current $ZEC supply is knowable, auditable, and does not require extraordinary effort or time to confirm.

Sources:
CoinDesk: Zcash Ironwood Goes Live
Cryptonomist: Zcash Ironwood Upgrade Secures Network with Verified Shielded Pool
Crowdfund Insider: Zcash Launches Ironwood Upgrade Following Orchard Security Vulnerability