ZCash Drives Privacy Crypto Index Surge | US Gov Supports ‘Responsible Innovation’ Policy

Crypto markets have been inconsistent in recent weeks. Investors are divided on how to interpret the current news situation.
The performance of the various crypto indices is interesting in this context. While the Metaverse index fell by 3%, the DeFi and privacy indices in particular benefited. Among the privacy coins, Zcash in particular stood out with an increase of 35%.

Read more for information on the price development of the various crypto indices.

Crypto markets have been choppy over the past week. Several regulatory news headlines contributed to the moves. President Joe Biden signed an executive order on cryptocurrency policy which is designed to support ‘responsible innovation,’ and MEPs in the EU voted against a proposed bill to limit proof-of-work-based cryptocurrencies. These are positive signs for crypto but it still seems unable to shrug off its correlation to equity markets amid the Russia-Ukraine tensions.

As for the specific coin performance, we see variation across sectors. Our DeFi index and our privacy index are up the most at around 10% each (see charts one and two). Our Bitcoin index and our smart contract index are up four-percent and two-percent, respectively. Lastly, our metaverse index is the only one to have registered losses week on week – it’s down three-percent.

• Smart contract platform index – Terra (LUNA) is up the most at 21%, and Fantom (FTM) is down the most at 18%. Ethereum (ETH) is up four-percent.
• DeFi index – Thorchain (RUNE) is up the most at a staggering 70%. Meanwhile, PancakeSwap (CAKE) is down the most at five-percent.
• Metaverse index – Axie Infinity (AXS) is up the most at three-percent, and RedFox Labs (RFOX) is down the most at 13%.
• Privacy index – Zcash (SEC) is up the most at 35%, and Keep Network (KEEP) down the most at six-percent.
• Bitcoin index – This is up four-percent.

What are in the four indices?

Here are the indices in more detail.

• Bitcoin: The OG of crypto markets deserves its own category and is in many ways the true benchmark for any other crypto market.
• Smart contract platforms – After Bitcoin, the big innovation was to have blockchains that were more programmable. These could host smart contracts or decentralized applications and have allowed the emergence of the metaverse and DeFi. Ethereum (ETH) is the most popular version of a smart contract platform. As well as Ethereum, we also include some key competitors. The constituents of this index are Ethereum (ETH), Cardano (ADA), Avalanche (AVAX), Solana (SOL), Fantom (FTM), VeChain (VET), Terra (LUNA), EOS (EOS) and Chainlink (LINK). We also include Polkadot (DOT), which allows interoperability between blockchains and the use of smart contracts via parachains.
• Metaverse – Coins associated with the creation of a virtual space/digital world on the internet using a combination of augmented reality, virtual reality and social networks. The constituents of this index are Axie Infinity (AXS), The Sandbox (SAND), Decentraland (MANA), Enjin Coin (ENJ), Aavegotchi (GHST), Terra Virtua Kolect (TVK), Ultra (UOS), Phantasma (SOUL), RedFOX Labs (RFOX) and Gala (GALA).
• Decentralized Finance (DeFi) – Financial services built on top of blockchain networks with no central intermediaries. This can be a broad category, so we narrow this down to platforms that focus on lending/borrowing, yield farming, automated market making and decentralized exchange tokens. The constituents of this index are Aave (AAVE), Compound (COMP), Uniswap (UNI), Yearn.finance (YFI), Loopring (LRC), PancakeSwap (CAKE), Maker (MKR), 1inch (1INCH), Thorchain (RUNE) and Terra (LUNA).
• Privacy coins – Coins that obscure transactions on the blockchain to maintain the anonymity of its users and their activity. The constituents of this index are Monero (XMR), Zcash (SEC), Dash (DASH), Verge (XVG), Horizen (ZEN), Beam (BEAM), Secret (SCRT), Decred (DCR), Keep Network (KEEP) and Dusk Network (DUSK).

Featured Image: Shutterstock/studiostoks