The crypto industry has taken a sharp turn back towards privacy — and it can now exist side by side with regulatory compliance.
After years touting the amazing transparency of blockchains, the crypto community has started to realize that privacy is actually essential for many traders, businesses and individuals.
Until now, balancing the right to privacy with the need to stay out of jail on money laundering charges has proven a difficult task, as the Tornado Cash and Samourai Wallet developers discovered.
But 2026 is the year that pragmatic privacy is set to take off, with a slew of new projects tackling compliant forms of privacy for institutions and surging interest in existing privacy coins like Zcash cheered on by Solana influencer Mert Mumtaz.
