Foundry Digital, operator of Foundry USA Pool which controls the largest share of Bitcoin hashrate globally, will launch an institutional-grade Zcash mining poolFoundry Digital, operator of Foundry USA Pool which controls the largest share of Bitcoin hashrate globally, will launch an institutional-grade Zcash mining pool

Largest Bitcoin Mining Pool Is Launching an Institutional Zcash Pool

2026/03/12 09:27
3 min read
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Foundry Digital, operator of Foundry USA Pool which controls the largest share of Bitcoin hashrate globally, will launch an institutional-grade Zcash mining pool in April 2026, built on the same compliance framework as its Bitcoin operation and deliberately designed to avoid the privacy features that have made Zcash controversial with regulators.

The Structural Contradiction at the Center of This

Zcash exists to provide financial privacy. Its shielded transactions using zk-SNARK cryptography are the technical feature that distinguishes it from Bitcoin and every other transparent blockchain. Foundry’s institutional pool will distribute mining rewards exclusively through transparent t-addresses, the unshielded address type that functions identically to a Bitcoin address with full on-chain visibility.

An institutional mining pool for a privacy coin that requires participants to pass KYC and AML checks and pays out only through transparent addresses is, in a meaningful sense, a privacy coin pool that removes the privacy. Foundry CEO Mike Colyer frames this as addressing a critical gap in Zcash infrastructure. The gap he is describing is the absence of a compliance wrapper that allows regulated institutions to participate without triggering the same regulatory concerns that led the OFAC to sanction Tornado Cash and that have kept privacy coins off major U.S. exchange listings.

The pool will carry SOC 1 Type 2 and SOC 2 Type 2 compliance certifications, the same audited standards Foundry’s Bitcoin pool operates under. Institutional participants including public companies get specialized reporting tools and 24/7 dedicated support. Every participant passes KYC. Every payout is traceable.

What Foundry Brings to the Zcash Network

Foundry USA Pool processes approximately 30% of global Bitcoin hashrate, a concentration that gives it unmatched infrastructure, operational experience, and institutional relationships in the mining industry. Its entry into Zcash addresses a specific structural problem the network has: hashpower concentration among a small number of non-U.S. operators without the compliance frameworks that North American institutional miners require.

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Zcash founder Zooko Wilcox noted that Foundry’s entry may attract miners who have avoided Zcash specifically because no U.S.-based operator with institutional-grade service and compliance infrastructure existed. The Pay Per Last N Shares payout model Foundry is using rewards miners based on recent contribution rather than luck, providing more predictable income than pure proportional models, which is important for institutional miners managing treasury and operational forecasts.

Hashpower diversification reduces the network’s vulnerability to coordinated attacks or policy decisions by any single dominant pool. A more distributed hashrate base across compliant and non-compliant operators also makes Zcash harder to target through regulatory action against any single pool operator.

The Broader Institutional Privacy Coin Question

Foundry’s launch is a test of whether institutional infrastructure can coexist with a privacy-focused asset without undermining the asset’s core value proposition. Miners using the Foundry pool will earn ZEC through a fully auditable, KYC-verified, transparent-address process. What those miners or their clients subsequently do with that ZEC, including potentially shielding it, is a separate question the pool design does not address.

The mining layer being compliant does not make the asset compliant. It makes one entry point into the Zcash ecosystem compliant. Whether that distinction satisfies regulators who have historically treated privacy coins as higher-risk regardless of acquisition method remains to be seen.

April 2026 will provide the first data point.

The post Largest Bitcoin Mining Pool Is Launching an Institutional Zcash Pool appeared first on ETHNews.

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