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ECC Team Resigns Over Bootstrap Board’s Departure from Zcash Mission

ECC Team Resigns Over Bootstrap Board’s Departure from Zcash Mission

On January 7, roughly 25 Electric Coin Company members resigned after disputes over privatizing the Zashi wallet, triggering a sharp ZEC price drop and plans to launch a new wallet, CashZ, using existing code.

ZEC

Fact Check
The assessment is based on multiple, consistent, high-authority primary sources. The founder of the Electric Coin Company, Zooko Wilcox-O'Hearn, and another company leader, Jason Swihart, both publicly confirmed their resignations and cited issues with the Bootstrap board as the reason. This is further corroborated by a post on the official Zcash Community Forum, a primary communication channel for the project, which directly addresses the ECC team's departure in relation to the Bootstrap board. The evidence comes directly from the individuals involved in the resignation, making it highly credible. The lower-authority secondary sources, which are commentaries from unaffiliated parties, do not contradict the primary evidence and are not relevant for establishing the facts. The convergence of testimony from key figures on official and personal channels provides strong, direct support for the statement.
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Summary

The entire Electric Coin Company team, comprising about 25 members including the CEO, resigned from its role connected to Zcash on January 7 following a dispute centered on plans to privatize the Zashi wallet. The news led to an immediate market reaction, with ZEC falling approximately 20%. Departing team members announced plans to release a new wallet, named CashZ, within weeks, built using the Zashi codebase. Despite the resignations, there was no indication that the Zcash protocol itself was technically affected.

Terms & Concepts
  • Zashi wallet: A digital wallet associated with the Zcash ecosystem, designed to manage and transact ZEC, and central to the recent governance dispute.
  • ZEC: The native cryptocurrency of the Zcash network, whose market price declined sharply following the ECC team’s resignation.
  • CashZ: A newly announced wallet project planned by former ECC members, intended to launch using the Zashi wallet’s existing codebase.