Anaximander for ZCG (December 2025)

Governance ZCG Elections
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Switzerland – outsider perspective for the third ZCG seat

I am running as the deliberate outsider candidate.

In past elections the third seat has often been more open than the first two, and has sometimes gone to fresh, external perspectives that complement the committee’s strengths.

That is the role I am aiming to fill.

Why I am running

Two months ago I discovered Zcash through Naval Ravikant and Balaji Srinivasan.

The conclusion was immediate and unavoidable: Zcash is the privacy layer any future Network State, and any free society, will need.

Financial privacy is the foundation of free speech; free speech is the foundation of human liberty.

Cryptocurrencies gave us decentralized money but left every transaction and balance public, a problem that AI is making dramatically worse.

Zcash solved this brilliantly. We now have the strongest privacy technology on earth.

The next decisive stage is to make private money actually used, simple, direct, and unstoppable in the real world.

This is not just about better technology. It is about what kind of society we want to live in.

We must win. That is why I am running.

My background – deliberately different

Quantitative finance → investment banking → Ministry of Finance → diplomatic financial-affairs roles where I participated in the preparatory work and committees that created the Financial Stability Board (2008–2009), held bilateral diplomatic positions on financial matters, and worked with stakeholders across the sector → today running our family’s private investment company (land acquisition, residential compounds, new industrial factory) while preparing to co-lead the broader industrial family business.

For almost 20 years I have evaluated risk, allocated capital, and designed incentives across banking, government, diplomacy, real estate, and manufacturing.

Why this seat needs an outsider with my experience

The current committee is excellent: deep protocol knowledge, long-term commitment, proven execution.

A small, high-performing team becomes stronger when it deliberately adds someone who thinks differently.

An outsider who has spent two decades allocating capital and designing incentives in banking, government, diplomacy, real estate, and manufacturing brings a perspective that is missing today.

That difference is the exact ingredient that will make the whole team sharper and more effective.

My vision for Zcash’s next stage

ZCG must turn Zcash from “best technology” into unstoppable private money in practice.

Every project will be judged on two levels:

  1. Its own merit

  2. Its positive (or negative) contribution to the entire ecosystem

The guiding star is the end-user: shield once → spend privately forever, with zero friction.

Zcash will also be the cryptocurrency that corporations and institutions can hold and move privately — the natural private treasury asset for Network States and private companies alike.

My three non-negotiable rules

  1. Net shielded-spending impact is the only metric that counts

  2. Projects that deliver the highest shielded-spending impact get funded first and fastest, with iron-clad milestones and clawbacks

  3. A protected slice for loyal long-term builders and visionary research — always within a strict ceiling

Commitment

I have no fixed ideology on ZSAs, hybrid PoS, or any other proposal.

My only test: does it make private money simpler, cheaper, and more widely spent without compromise?

Thank you for considering a different mind that will make the committee stronger.

Let’s make private money unstoppable together.

(No prior Zcash grants · Switzerland · Long ZEC)

If you believe the third seat should go to a conflict-free outsider who has spent two decades allocating capital and designing incentives at the highest level, I would be honored by your approval.

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Feel free to ask any questions if you’d like to discuss or get to know me better.

I’ll also share a few older posts from the forum and X in the coming days so you can see how I think about privacy, incentives, governance, and making private money unstoppable.

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Governance
A short note on governance

Governance will decide Zcash’s long-term fate more than any single technology upgrade.

In the last days I’ve seen several interesting discussions on this topic in the forum, so I wanted to share a few thoughts that are central to how I would approach the committee.

In the long run, effective governance, not just technology, will determine Zcash’s success and survival.

There is no bulletproof solution. Every design choice eventually reveals flaws that will be exploited. Good governance must therefore be both stable enough to provide continuity and trust, and flexible enough to adapt to new realities.

I see real strength in the fact that Zcash’s institutions (ZF, ECC, ZCAP, ZCG, ZIP process, Shielded Labs) operate under different governance models, funding sources, missions, and time horizons. This deliberate diversity spreads power, reduces single points of failure, and lets competing approaches learn from one another. Some overlap of talented individuals across organizations is normal and actually helps coordination, you see the same in mature political, financial, and economic systems.

Building truly excellent governance is inherently slow work.

I participated in the preparatory work and committees that created the international Financial Stability Board in 2008–2009. That experience taught me just how delicate and high-stakes these decisions are, which is why I believe any further evolution of Zcash governance must be thought through very carefully.

Happy to discuss any of this.

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Just saw the great thread between @ebfull and @nuttycom on X and wanted to share the reply I posted there, it sums up pretty well how I think about the decisive next stage for Zcash.

The consumer must never have to think about privacy, it just works, invisible and faster than anything else. If using Zcash privately ever feels like extra work, we’ve already lost.

Simplicity has to be the obsession.

Crosslink’s PoS direction is exciting exactly because it turns infrastructure into a real competitive market: builders, node operators, stakers, everyone racing to make the network cheaper, faster, more reliable.

ZCG can accelerate this by being ruthless: fund only what moves net shielded-spending impact, fast, with iron-clad milestones and clawbacks, and deliberately seed the incentives that let a self-sustaining market take over and live on its own.

The best ideas win, the worst die, that’s relentless improvement without central planning.

That’s the next step to make Zcash truly unstoppable.
Happy to discuss more. This is the decisive phase.

Here the link to the discussion:

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Hi :slight_smile: Welcome to the race!

Question: how do you plan to make sure your ZCG decisions reflect the needs of Zcash users and represent the community?

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Hi Peacemonger, thank you!

My motto is engagement and transparency.

My selection criteria and thought process will always be public on the forum.

I will actively engage with all relevant stakeholders to understand their needs and concerns. Every decision rationale will be published transparently.

I would propose that ZCG publishes a short “one-pager” on the forum (updated when needed) with:

• the key criteria we are using (I have already suggested some in my candidacy)

• the main objectives we believe the ecosystem should focus on next

The goal is to give some sense of direction. This way ZCG doesn’t just represent the community; it also helps guide and structure the discussion.

Finally, I want to better leverage local communities: support their initiatives and have them share their on-the-ground experiences and user feedback back with us.

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Hi Peacemonger,

I have just realized that my answer to your question was put in my thread instead as of a direct reply here. In case, you haven’t seen it, it is here :

Also, I will take this opportunity to share a tweet which is related and goes a bit beyond your question. I really think we should encourage engagement with our local communities.

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Your background is in fund management (among other things) so it’s not surprising that you’d run for a ZCG seat. My question is this:

If you didn’t win a seat, would you still be interested in participating the in the Zcash community? What role, or roles would be of sufficient interest to contribute to, in that scenario?

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Hi, thank you for the question.

Look, if I don’t get elected to the committee, obviously my voice won’t carry as much weight and a lot of my ideas for Zcash will be harder to push through.

But honestly, that won’t stop me. I’ll still do everything I can to help.

I just love how Zcash works, it’s genuinely fascinating to me, and I really want to see it succeed and grow.

So yeah, elected or not, I’m still gonna show up and contribute whatever I can.

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I like your profile, hopefully you win that seat.

Whether you win or not, would you accept to participate to each stakeholder vote transparently? That way I can delegate my funds to you and we can all observe how you steer 0.5% of the network.

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Thank you, I really appreciate the support.

I’m for transparency and accountability including thought process. If I win a seat, my votes and rationales will be public on the forum.

On the exact details, I’ll check the details later; right now I’m fully focused on preparing for tomorrow.

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Key messages from yesterday’s community call

I just shared the main points that resonated with me from the call and my positions in the official candidate-questions thread:

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My Framework for ZCG: Turning the Best Privacy Tech into Unstoppable Private Money

Zcash already has the best privacy technology on earth.

To win, we must now accelerate, transform it into private money that individuals, merchants, and institutions actually use every day.

Shield once. Spend privately forever. Zero friction.

That is the mission. That is why I am running.

Simplicity must be our obsession, and the true multipliers are the passionate developers, local communities, merchants, and businesses worldwide who will make private money a reality. ZCG’s role is to empower them with resources, clear direction, and trust, then get out of the way.

The Distinct Role of ZCG: Proactive, Forward-Looking Capital Allocation

Unlike retroactive Dev Fund slices that reward past work, ZCG exists to say “yes” to bold, strategic projects that wouldn’t otherwise exist or would take far longer. We fund the future that today is only on paper.

By publishing a concise annual one-pager (key criteria + strategic priorities), prepared by the full committee in open consultation with the community, we combine proactive leadership with complete transparency and accountability.

Guiding Principle

Every proposal is evaluated on two levels:

  1. Its own merit

  2. Its contribution to the broader ecosystem

The end-user is always the North Star: seamless private spending for people, and a natural private treasury asset for companies, institutions, and network states.

My Three Non-Negotiable Rules

  1. Net Shielded-Spending Impact is the Only Metric That Counts
    Real-world private usage is king. Simple proxies: volume of shielded-to-shielded transactions + unique addresses with at least one private spend in the last 90 days.

  2. Highest-Impact Projects Get Funded First and Fastest with Iron-Clad Milestones and Clawbacks
    Initiatives that deliver the biggest shielded-spending lift quickly (ideally within 12 months) take priority. Strict accountability is non-negotiable.

  3. A Protected Slice for Loyal Long-Term Builders and Visionary Research: Strictly Capped
    A limited, capped portion of the budget is reserved for proven teams and resilience-building work (security, infrastructure, institutional trust). It never crowds out core impact projects.

Transparency, Collaboration, and a Growth Mindset

The choice is never just “approve or reject.” What we fund sends a powerful signal about what we value as a community.

I approach every proposal with a growth mindset: there is almost always a third path: working collaboratively with applicants to reshape scope, timing, or milestones for maximum impact and minimum risk. Flexibility and common sense are essential, while the same rigorous criteria apply to all.

This framework is designed to help serious builders succeed, not to create hurdles.

Empowering Local Communities and Multipliers

Passionate local communities, education initiatives, and on-the-ground teams are adoption accelerators. We should resource them systematically and use their real-world feedback to sharpen our priorities just as I did when engaging stakeholders in my diplomatic career.

A sharper brand and strategic focus will also unlock deeper structural partnerships (the Brave proposal is one example).

This Framework Is a Living Document

I welcome criticism, questions, and suggestions from everyone : ZCAP members, builders, applicants, and the wider community. The goal is to make this framework as effective as possible, and your input will only make it stronger.

Feel free to reply here on the forum, reach out on X (https://x.com/blueai8866?), or send me a direct message anytime.

In Practice

This framework already guides my reviews of current proposals:

• General vision: ZCG Nominations Now Open! - #57 by Anaximander

• Brave 90-Day Campaign: Zcash 90-Day Global Privacy Campaign via Brave — Dec 2025 through Feb 2026 - #12 by Anaximander

• ZGo Migration to Zebra: ZGo Migration to Zebra - Grant Application - #11 by Anaximander

• Bootstrapped & Deterministic Builds (StageX): Bootstrapped and deterministic builds a la StageX - #9 by Anaximander

• ZecHub 2026: ZecHub 2026 - #7 by Anaximander

If elected, I will champion this approach on the committee: clear rules, transparent decisions, and an unrelenting focus on turning Zcash into the private money the world needs now.

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ZCG Candidate Questions Thread - Post and Upvote!
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Final note before the vote – why I believe this is the decisive moment

Governance > ZCG Elections

After listening to the community call and reading every question, I want to leave you with one simple truth:

Zcash already has the best privacy technology ever built.

The only thing standing between us and unstoppable private money is velocity.

My framework is designed for exactly that:‎

  • one metric only (net shielded-spending impact)

  • fastest funding + iron-clad milestones for the highest-impact projects

  • capped protected slice for loyal builders and visionary research

  • annual one-pager so everyone knows the direction in advance

  • growth mindset: every proposal is an opportunity to collaborate, not just approve/reject

I am running because the awakening has begun, more insiders will follow. We either accelerate now, or we forfeit sovereign money forever.

If you want ZCG to move with urgency and clarity while staying collaborative and transparent, I would be honored to earn your approval.

Thank you for your time and your vote.

Anaximander

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What does this mean? The only addresses that are public are taddresses.

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No t-addresses are counted.

The goal is to develop a privacy-respecting proxy that could reflect

  • transaction volume (how often people are using shielded spending)
  • and breadth (how many different people/notes are actively using privacy).

This would give us a guiding metric to track overall ecosystem health, compare project impact, and ensure strategic alignment, a true “hedgehog concept” (inspired by the book Good to Great by Jim Collins).

Because shielded transactions are fully private, we simply cannot directly count individual private-to-private spends the way we can see everything on t-addresses. This is why a proxy is needed.

I see it first as a north-star principle for choosing and prioritising grants.

Later, we can explore practical ways to measure the incremental contribution of individual projects and build a transparent dashboard.

I’m fully open to collaborating with the community and builders to refine exactly how we implement this. The important thing is that we move toward a single metric that rewards private usage.

@zancas

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Governance > ZCG Elections

The shielded-spending metric is a living hedgehog, open to every builder and every candidate who wants velocity to win.

I’m ready to co-design the proxies, the dashboards, the attribution, whatever makes private usage the only thing that gets rewarded.

Let’s build it together after the poll.

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You seem thoughtful and you seem to intend to do good, but…

To bring insight and judicious decisions in the capacity of being on ZCG board, directing potentially significant funds, how do you think you will overcome the fact you’ve only been aware of this project for just over 50 days? Do you not think this will put you in an impossible position to gauge not just the current state of affairs, but actually help to steer this rapidly changing ecosystem?

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Governance > ZCG Elections
@aaal
Thank you for this excellent question. It’s thoughtful, direct, and exactly the kind of rigorous challenge the community should demand from anyone seeking to help steward ZCG’s independent grant allocations. I’m genuinely glad you raised it.

You’re absolutely right: I’ve been actively engaged with Zcash for only about two months. But this isn’t a drawback. It’s a deliberate advantage, and it’s why I’m running specifically for the third seat, which has historically been the most open to fresh, external perspectives that complement the committee’s deep insiders and prevent echo chambers.

When I realized (through voices like Naval and Balaji) that Zcash is the only credible privacy layer built to endure the next century, I didn’t hesitate. I showed up fully committed, because privacy isn’t just technology to me; it’s the foundation of a free society. (My long-term advocacy for liberty and sound money runs deep. Feel free to check my X history for context.)

The committee already has world-class builders and protocol experts. What it needs now is a conflict-free outsider allocator whose career has been defined by rigorous capital discipline in environments of abundance: saying no to good ideas that don’t accelerate real-world adoption.

For nearly 20 years, I’ve assessed risk and designed incentives across quantitative finance, investment banking—where I routinely negotiated and executed contracts valued between $1 million and $10 million, with transactions reaching up to $100 million—the Ministry of Finance, diplomatic financial roles (including preparatory work for the Financial Stability Board during the 2008 crisis and bilateral negotiations), and today leading our family’s private investment firm in real estate development while preparing to co-lead the broader industrial manufacturing operations.

ZCG isn’t just a passive allocator. It’s the community’s independent grants program, and its highest calling is to be proactive: funding bold, forward-looking projects that wouldn’t otherwise exist, turning ideas on paper into the future of private money. Anaximander for ZCG (December 2025) - #13 by Anaximander

To win the next decade, we have to accelerate now: make Zcash the private money people actually use every day. Shield once. Spend privately forever. Zero friction.

The consumer must never have to think about privacy. It just works, invisible and faster than anything else. If private spending ever feels like extra work, we’ve already lost. Simplicity has to be the obsession.

The real engines of adoption are bottom-up: passionate local communities, developers, merchants, and businesses worldwide. ZCG’s job is to empower them with resources, trust, and space. Then get out of the way.

In practice, everything filters through one north-star metric: net shielded-spending impact (shielded-to-shielded volume + breadth of active private spenders). Projects that demonstrably move this get funded fast, with iron-clad milestones and clawbacks. (See my detailed thoughts on the metric and dashboard here and here.)

My motto: engagement and transparency. Every selection criteria, thought process, and decision rationale will be public on the forum. I’ll actively engage stakeholders to understand needs and concerns. (Transparency commitment here.)

If elected, my immediate proactive missions:

  1. Lead the committee in publishing a community-vetted one-pager on grant criteria and strategic priorities: forward-looking, incentive-aligned, ruthlessly focused on user adoption and simplicity. (Initial ideas on my framework here.)
  2. Co-lead building privacy-respecting proxies and a transparent dashboard for shielded-spending impact. So we reward only what grows private usage.
  3. Systematically amplify global local communities as multipliers: fund their initiatives and channel on-the-ground user feedback back to the ecosystem.
  4. Champion deliberate, balanced governance evolution that preserves stability, diversity, and resilience. (My thoughts here and exploratory ideas on aligning roles here and here.)

In a fast-changing ecosystem, fresh disciplined momentum from a conflict-free outsider isn’t a risk. It’s the catalyst we need to reach the next million users and make private money unstoppable.

If you believe ZCG should accelerate toward everyday private money (with simplicity, local empowerment, transparency, and unyielding focus on shielded impact), I’d be honored to earn your vote.

Open to any follow-ups here or in DMs.

Thanks again. Strong questions like yours make this community truly unstoppable.

Anaximander
ZCG Candidate – December 2025

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