Ekubo, the dominant automated market maker on Starknet, has introduced private swaps for shielded tokens, allowing traders to transact without linking their identities or wallet histories to individual trades. The feature uses Starknet’s STRK20 privacy framework and the ShieldedSwapRouter, which combines zero-knowledge proofs (cryptographic proofs without revealing underlying data) and Merkle proofs to verify funds and trading authorization. The router then uses Ekubo’s existing ILocker callback interface to execute the transaction through a standard liquidity pool, so the pool observes an ordinary swap while the trader’s identity remains hidden. The privacy layer does not conceal swap amounts or price impacts, and the router charges a 30 basis point fee in addition to Ekubo’s standard pool fees. Ekubo announced the capability on March 10, 2026, with implementation confirmed in the months that followed. The first highlighted use case is strkBTC, a shielded representation of Bitcoin on Starknet. Routing private and public trades through the same pools avoids splitting liquidity between separate venues, while preserving Ekubo’s concentrated-liquidity model, public-swap fee structure and wider Starknet position. The new path uses the ShieldedSwapRouter and Obelysk-built contracts without directly changing Ekubo’s core pool contracts. Traders must first hold shielded tokens in a compatible shielded balance before using the private route.