- A Winklevoss-affiliated trust filed an S-1 registration statement with the SEC on October 6, 2026 to launch a spot Zcash exchange-traded fund
- The proposed fund would trade under the ticker “WINK” and charge an annual unified fee of 0.25% of its ZEC holdings
- The filing describes the trust’s objective as providing exposure to the price of ZEC, the native token of the privacy-focused Zcash network
A trust affiliated with Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss filed an S-1 registration statement with the SEC dated October 6, 2026, seeking to launch the Winklevoss Zcash ETF, a proposed spot exchange-traded fund that would hold ZEC, the digital asset created and transmitted through the Zcash network.
The filing proposes the ticker “WINK” and sets an annual unified fee of 0.25% of the trust’s ZEC holdings, a structure similar to the fee arrangements used by existing spot bitcoin and ether ETFs. According to the prospectus, the trust’s investment objective is to provide exposure to the price of ZEC held by the trust, net of the fund’s expenses and other liabilities, without the fund itself engaging in staking or other yield-generating activity on its holdings.
Zcash is one of the longest-running privacy-focused cryptocurrencies, using zero-knowledge proofs to let users shield transaction details while still settling on a public blockchain. The token has drawn renewed attention in 2026 as regulators and institutions have grown more comfortable with privacy-preserving technology that still supports compliance tooling, a shift that has helped spur a wave of new privacy-coin ETF filings from multiple issuers.
The Winklevoss filing follows the twins’ long history in the digital asset space through Gemini, the exchange they co-founded, and adds to a growing list of altcoin-focused ETF applications working their way through the SEC’s registration process in 2026. Issuers have increasingly targeted assets beyond bitcoin and ether, including privacy coins, as they look to capture investor demand for regulated, exchange-traded exposure to a broader slice of the digital asset market, with several competing Zcash fund applications now pending alongside the Winklevoss filing.
Like other S-1 filings, the Winklevoss Zcash ETF registration must still clear SEC review before any shares can be listed and traded, a process that typically involves multiple rounds of comment and amendment before a fund is cleared to launch. The filing nonetheless signals growing issuer confidence that regulators are open to approving exchange-traded products built around assets that were once considered too sensitive for mainstream investment vehicles, given Zcash’s privacy features and the zero-knowledge technology underpinning its shielded transactions.
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