Centi and Zcash Shielded Assets - A Co-Creation Project

Community Grants Applications
1

Dear Zcash Community,

As Zcash Shielded Assets (ZSAs) get closer to deployment, I’m excited to share with you all an exciting project from Centi that will work with ZSAs and even launch a ZSA stablecoin!

I’d like to invite @BernhardCenti to tell us more about it and share the grant proposal here.

We at QEDIT are excited to see this interest from Centi, and look forward to seeing this integration come to fruition!

9 Likes
2

@vivek many thanks for your post and please see all details in the actual proposal linked. And introduction to who we are right here and please see the full grant proposal linked at the bottom of this introduction:

Centi’s Introduction to the Zcash Community

The Privacy Problem No One Talks About

Privacy is not a luxury feature - it’s a financial necessity. Yet while billions of people desperately need financial privacy protection, most privacy solutions remain theoretical experiments disconnected from real-world payment infrastructure.

We’re here to change that.

Who We Are

I’m Bernhard Müller, founder and CEO of Centi Ltd. My co-founder Ralf Zellweger and I built Centi specifically to solve cross-border payments where traditional banking fails people who need it most. My background is in bioengineering and compliance, Ralf brings vast payment systems experience from both acquiring and issuing sides.

Here’s what makes us different: We’re the only privacy-focused payment platform operating under Swiss financial regulations - proving that privacy and compliance aren’t mutually exclusive. We’ve been doing this since 2019, processing real transactions for real people every day.

What We Bring to Zcash - Day One Impact

Immediate Access

Numbers
Active Users Ready to Use ZEC 25,000+
Merchants Ready to Accept Zcash 500+
Merchants Gaining Transaction Privacy 500+
Reachable Wallets (Africa/S.America) 350 million
Proven Payment Corridors 20+ countries
Existing Stablecoin Infrastructure Swiss Bank Guaranteed

We’re not asking for funding to build a user base from scratch. On day one of our integration, Zcash gains a functioning payment ecosystem with massive transaction volume.

The Regulatory Breakthrough

Operating under Swiss financial regulations, we demonstrate daily that privacy-preserving payments work within institutional compliance requirements. This isn’t theoretical - we do it every day with existing digital currencies.

This matters because: When other financial institutions see Zcash working under Swiss regulations (the global gold standard), adoption barriers disappear. We’re creating the regulatory template for global Zcash expansion.

Why Zcash + ZSA Changes Everything

When we discovered Zcash Shielded Assets, we realized this could be the privacy-preserving infrastructure our users have been waiting for. The Centi Franc is already a permissionless stablecoin guaranteed by Swiss Bank Guarantee. Using ZSA technology, we can make it truly private for all our users.

Commercial ZSA Validation: We’ll implement the first large-scale commercial deployment of Zcash Shielded Assets - loyalty tokens, vouchers, and the CCHF stablecoin - proving the technology works for real businesses.

Merchant Privacy - The Hidden Need

Critical insight: Our 500+ merchants currently face a painful choice with stablecoins - accept digital payments but expose all transaction data, or stick with cash and lose digital convenience.

With Zcash, merchants get both: Digital payment efficiency AND transaction privacy. No more forced disclosure of customer spending patterns, competitor intelligence, or sensitive business metrics.

This unlocks massive adoption: Merchants have been waiting for privacy-preserving digital payments without realizing it. We’re giving 500+ merchants immediate access to what they actually need.

African Market Access - Where Privacy Matters Most

We’ve spent years building payment corridors into 20+ African countries, creating infrastructure that brings Zcash to populations who would benefit most from financial privacy. Our remittance network reaches 350 million wallets where traditional banking often exploits or excludes people.

Real impact: Instant settlement versus 3-7 day traditional transfers, sub-1% fees versus 5-15% traditional fees, transaction privacy without sacrificing compliance.

Our Commitment - Skin in the Game

This isn’t a short-term project. We’re making Zcash core infrastructure at Centi because we believe privacy-preserving payments represent the future of ethical finance. Our $50,000 co-investment demonstrates our commitment, and our business model depends on this succeeding long-term.

Knowledge sharing: Our integration patterns, compliance frameworks, and merchant tools will be available for other developers, accelerating Zcash adoption beyond our platform.

Why Now

ZSA is production-ready. We have the infrastructure. The market needs privacy. This is the moment.

We’re not asking you to fund an experiment. We’re asking you to help us bring proven Zcash technology to proven payment infrastructure, creating immediate impact while building a model other financial institutions can follow.

The Bottom Line

We’re ready to make Zcash the privacy standard for 350+ million users across Europe and Africa. We have the regulatory standing, the infrastructure, and the user base.

Zcash deserves to be infrastructure that serves real people solving real problems.

Let’s discuss how to make this happen!

Questions? Post them as a reply here or reach us at bernhard@centi.ch - we’re excited to contribute to Zcash’s mission of bringing financial privacy to everyone who needs it.

Grant Proposal for the Zcash Community Grants

10 Likes
3

Hi @BernhardCenti - Welcome to the forum, and thank you for submitting your grant proposal! We will review it in the upcoming weeks and reach out if we have any questions.

In the meantime, if you have any questions for us, you can post them to this thread or message us in the Signal group we created.

Zcash Community - We want to hear your feedback on this grant! You can post your comments to this thread or DM us at @ZcashGrants if you’d like to provide feedback in private.

Thanks!

2 Likes
5

Wow. This is very exciting. Looking forward to reviewing this grant proposal in detail.

1 Like
6

How does the KYC/AML work? Will the stablecoin have a viewing key backdoor that enables you to see all transactions?

3 Likes
7

Exciting!!

3 Likes
8

Centi is a money services provider. We can exchange up to 1000 CHF per month and user without KYC. Beyond that we have to KYC. The Shielded Assets allow different time of issuances. In case of Centi Franc on ZSA we would not have discretion over transactions (e.g. co-signature control or any part in a valid transfer), the token is on chain like cash. The asset could be issued with a ZSA addition that allows the issuer to see the distribution table of the asset and create transparency vs. the auditor.

So in short there will be no direct tie of the ZSA to the user. The assets can be freely transferred like cash without any intermediary (apart from the Zcash network). Users can freely accept the asset without any pre-registration of any kind. Also mind you the Centi Franc on ZSA will also be compatible with all other wallets, applications and ecosystem components that adopt ZSA. Centi is the official redemption site/provider for people to get CHF out of Centi Franc, but if e.g. an exchange lists them also, someone can even use it and enter/exit to fiat rails without needing to go through Centi. But yes, if you do come to us with e.g. 50k CHF in this asset to exchange it, we will have to KYC you. This is however, the company Centi and does not tie this identity to you on chain (and it is a shielded asset anyway).

Your business with Centi is private but not anonymous. If we KYC you, we will of course only share your data with authorities if we are forced to by legal circumstances.

4 Likes
9

Exciting! Some questions:

  1. Can you provide stats on adoption of the your stablecoin CCHF?

Merchants have been waiting for privacy-preserving digital payments without realizing it. We’re giving 500+ merchants immediate access to what they actually need.

  1. Per the quote above, can you please provide actual merchant anecdotes, from conversations you have with them? Intuitively it makes sense, but before disbursing a $350,000 grant it would be good to know the market actually exists beyond our gut instincts.

  2. How does a Swiss Franc denominated stablecoin make it into Africa payment networks? What are the top currencies used in Africa? From an uneducated perspective it seems like the local currencies and USD would be in the lead.

6 Likes
10

Dear @ml_sudo thank you for your interest and your questions:

  1. The Centi Franc is rather small today with an issued amount of 20’000’000 tokens representing 200k CHF backed by bank guarantee (190k CHF in circulation). This can easily be increased of course. Today the Centi Franc is not exchanged listed which means all the entry and exit volume is currently with us. The Centi Franc has 1.3 million transactions so far, many of them come from testing however. In the past two years we had several 10k economic transactions either with our merchants or in remittance (see point 3). The Centi Franc is also popular for HODL as the CHF is know to be very stable especially in times of economic and social uncertainties.

  2. Yes very good question. If you read the quite in detail you can also see the “without realizing it” part. We do have merchants which do have crypto know-how and these merchants are very well aware that if they e.g. use an ETH address to collect the money all the time, that their clients and competition could use the blockchain to see into their revenues. Most merchants make only little revenue with stablecoin today, but this is about to change massively and I am sure these big players will also need s solution for this issue. Shielded Accounts is a solution for this issue which you have available right here.

For reference here, some Info about big stablecoin payment initiatives by the big guys:

  1. There are two aspects to this:
  • Our current remittance business focusses fully on the corridor from Switzerland (and surrounding Europe) to Africa. Therefore the Europeans or European diaspora tops up their Centi App with Centi Franc, and then can use these Centi Franc to remit money to Africa (receiver receives local currency either on bank account or in mobile wallet).
  • However, talking to the diaspora here and also having visited Kenya, we see that there would also be a need for something like Centi directly in these countries. E.g. the Kenya Shilling has lost over 10% in value even against the USD last year, against CHF even more. So for people that do actually safe money, stablecoins are a grat option. We would like to offer Centi App also directly into African countries, but we first have to integrate meaningful on-ramps there, as our focus so far was only on payouts in Africa. Also some African countries, like e.g. Kenya, are implementing 1% transfer tax for payment system money (MPESA, Bank transfers, etc.). But this does not apply to cash (physical or digital) which could be a huge opportunity for wallets like Centi App. Edit: it is 1.5% even: State slashes digital transfer tax to 1.5 per cent to boost tech sector

Please let me know if you have any follow up questions.

1 Like
11

  1. The EU is reportedly going to ban privacy preserving coins in 2027. How will this affect Switzerland and by extension Centi?

  2. Do you have a list of countries you support for on- and off-ramping?

Sidenote to ZCG: I hope some of you will try to use the Centi app before making a decision.

4 Likes
12

Disclosure: I am advising a stablecoin project.

I don’t see why community money is needed to launch this. Why not fundraise from private investors? Respectfully I do not see this particular project as a good use of our funds.

Would your company launch this ZSA even without community funding, how truly committed are you to privacy?

2 Likes
13

Thanks for the comprehensive and quick response.

A $350,000 check size is a very large grant. Is there a smaller version of this grant that can test the market before more is invested?

What is a “ZSA tokenization specialist (7 months at $12,000/month = $84,000)”? To my knowledge ZSAs are too new to have people specialized in it? Haha

3 Likes
14

I installed this app and played around with it a bit. You can check it out with me at this link:

For some reason, I couldn’t delete my account after testing it. The app says my password is incorrect, even though I changed it to make sure it was correct. I don’t know what the problem is.

3 Likes
15

Centralized stablecoins are a dead end.
Who exactly wants to hold a digital censorable version of fiat currency whose purchasing power is melting like ice cubes?

1 Like
16

Dear @Milton

  1. You are right to think about the EU. We have done a lot of research also about EU laws and I am convinced ZSA (depending on the contract type) are compatible. That stated, as a Swiss company we currently only actively solicit (i.e. targeted advertising) business in Switzerland. The stablecoin is and will be a Swiss product. Swiss financial services companies are allowed to serve global customers, limits to active market penetration apply however.
  2. Yes I do. Currently to join the Centi App you need to have a phone number in one of these countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK, and the US.

Edit: These countries, except for a few, are our own risk and market considerations. We do think of bein opening more corridors, but we have to build onramps, see another post above about that.

The app is downloadable globally with Android, on iOS it is limited to Switzerland, EEA and EU.

For our brokerage (people would like to transact more than 10000 CHF) there is no specific county list, we have a risk based onboarding approach, pretty similar to other financial services providers.

1 Like
17

  1. No we would not, as the costs associated are significant and ZSA has no grown ecosystem yet like e.g. ERC-20ies on Arbitrum have (I take this as an example as this was the last technology we implemented)

  2. We are fully committed to digital cash and the privacy advantages it can bring. We also as a company target specific use cases where privacy is desirable. What we are not, however, is anarchists or a company does not play the the rules. Many of the rules are not up to us to make, we have to follow them, however. Mainly data protection and AML regulations.

1 Like
18

Yes the project can be started on a 50k grant for the first milestone. The community does not have to commit to more to get started.

We will build the specialist, and yes that takes time and some money, especially this person needs to be a fast learner. Basically development budget. If e.g. certain things are provided out of the community already, we will not have to make them. But we will for sure have to integrate rather deeply. And of course we would be open to work with someone from the community here also, especially e.g. someone from Zebra team could make a lot of sense.

2 Likes
19

Please write a mail to support@centi.ch with your account email. Since we are a financial services company we have to check if there are financial TXes associated to the account before deleting all data. If there are none, we will delete all your data. Let me know if you have any other questions or feedback. Thanks.

2 Likes
21

I recommend that ZCG rejects this grant. If the builder builds regardless without money, with passion, then they are the right fit for a retroactive grant. Zcash is the best technology to enable a private stablecoin. May the best builder win, without upfront funding.

1 Like
22

This is a reflective post with questions for @Bernhard

A good stablecoin, in general terms, should have a number of key features:

1. First, stability. Despite the opinion that centralized stablecoins are a dead end, this option is currently the one that gives the MAJORITY of people reasons to use them, even if I myself don’t like it, but that’s how it is. And historically, decentralized options have not been good enough. So far, only DAI has shown sustained stability due to the fact that Ethereum got off the ground during the formation of DAI. Of the popular USDD, FRAX, and LUSD, they show instability, but how many have completely collapsed: UST, USDN, IST and other.

Centralized options have also had problems, but they have been helped to survive by audited reports on collateral.

Since Centi’s CHF is not traded anywhere, this is currently uncertain. I simply cannot even check whether I will be able to exchange it for money in any country other than those on the list of partners.

The list is not bad, but how do I know that they will not stop accepting it tomorrow?

2. Collateral. You mentioned a bank guarantee. In my experience, this document is not that difficult to obtain for 2-5% of the contract price, depending on the country.I’m not sure if this is good collateral for a stablecoin. But maybe you could clarify how it works in practice? What exactly did you get a bank guarantee for? Why do you think this is a reliable method of collateral?

3. Liquidity. I touched on this topic above. But I just want to understand. If there is no market liquidity, can it even be called a stablecoin in the classical sense?

4. Regulatory compliance and auditing. For ZSA, I don’t yet understand how we will resolve this issue. As for auditing, this is more of a technical misunderstanding on my part. But regulatory compliance is the only thing that attracts me to this grant, to be honest.

I would like the community to try its hand at this to understand how much a stablecoin on ZSA can comply with the legislation of a developed economy. Switzerland has both fairly loyal regulation and, at the same time, traditionally the most specific and unambiguous regulation. This would help us assess our chances for expanding ZSA in this direction.

However, I don’t want to face the obvious situation where the grant is formally fulfilled, but the CHF shielded project is closed due to insurmountable circumstances. In that case, the community’s 350,000 would be thrown away, and that is something we cannot afford in our reality. This is about half of the quarterly budget of ECC, a large team focused on results. This is certainly a very sensitive issue, which is why I am asking you about it: how do you assess the chances that this will be legal in Switzerland? What analysis did you conduct to be sure of this?

4 Likes