The Zcash Blockchain is Now Live

Zcash has officially gone live.

The first transaction block of the privacy-focused blockchain has been created, a development that follows months of enthusiasm as well as growing momentum from market speculators.

Since it was proposed in May 2014, developers and backers have pitched Zcash as a financial tool designed to prioritize transaction privacy, one that could also solve for issues like fungibility that still affect bitcoin. Yet the project has had its detractors, including those who question the startup's business model and how it derives funding, in part, from the network itself.

In a livestream that ended just minutes ago, Zcash CEO Zooko Wilcox announced that the software was finally ready to download, declaring that he had successfully compiled his full node.

He told viewers:

Notably, the development team released two audits conducted by NCC Group and Coinspect, respectively, ahead of the launch.

The reports sought to identify potentially harmful bugs in the cryptocurrency's code prior to launch. (The audits can be found here and here).

"Today we are publishing the final reports of each external security auditor we contracted this summer to review our code," the startup said in a blog post from yesterday. "We've triaged the issues found and addressed any we considered severe."

Amidst the launch, derivatives trading tied to Zcash saw prices soar above 1 BTC, recording a high of nearly 2 BTC according to data from BitMEX.

If any indication, the digital currency markets may be in for more movement and volatility ahead.

Disclaimer: CoinDesk is a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which has an ownership stake in Zcash.

Rocket boy image via Shutterstock

Correction: This article has been updated to reflect that Coinspect, not CoinSecure, contributed one of the ZCash audits.