Zcash (ZEC) Price Risks 30% Drop Amid $41M Long Liquidation Threat

Zcash (ZEC) risks erasing its latest recovery as a bearish technical setup and $41 million in potential long liquidations threaten a 30% price drop.

ZEC Price Chart Warns of 30% Drop

Zcash is testing the upper boundary of a descending channel after rebounding sharply from its early-June crash.

The ZEC/USDT daily chart shows price approaching a resistance confluence around $490-$500, where the channel’s falling upper trendline meets a horizontal supply zone.

A rejection from the area could send ZEC back toward its 200-day exponential moving average (200-day EMA; the blue wave) near $388 in the coming weeks.

A deeper channel retracement would put the lower trendline around $320-$340 in focus, down roughly 30% from current prices near $477.

ZEC’s relative strength index (RSI) has recovered to around 55, showing improving buying momentum but no decisive bullish breakout. Meanwhile, the token is holding above its 50-day EMA (red) near $455.

Therefore, Zcash must decisively break above the $500-$520 resistance area to invalidate the immediate bearish channel outlook.

The technical warning follows one of Zcash’s most volatile periods in years.

In early June, ZEC plunged more than 60% in two days after the disclosure of a critical counterfeiting vulnerability in its Orchard shielded pool. The flaw was discovered on May 29 and could theoretically have allowed counterfeit ZEC to be created without detection.

An emergency network upgrade coordinated by Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL) and other ecosystem participants remediated the vulnerability by June 2, according to Shielded Labs.

The organization said there was no evidence that the bug was exploited, affected user funds, or changed ZEC’s total supply.

ZEC subsequently staged a sharp relief rally as ZODL, Shielded Labs, the Zcash Foundation, and other developers proposed Ironwood, a new shielded pool designed to make Zcash’s circulating supply independently verifiable.

Developers are targeting Ironwood activation for late July 2026, although Shielded Labs said the timing still depends on testing, review, and ecosystem coordination.

A recent community operator readiness update cited approximately July 21 as the working mainnet target, while noting that the final activation height was still pending.

That recovery narrative may have helped ZEC return toward $500. But derivatives positioning shows the rally faces another risk.

$500 Magnet Zone Comes With $41M Long Liquidation Threat

Zcash’s Binance liquidation heatmap shows its largest individual liquidity cluster sitting around $500, with roughly $1.55 million in potential short liquidation leverage concentrated near the level.

Such concentrated liquidation zones can act as price magnets because traders often watch them as areas where forced position closures may accelerate volatility.

For ZEC, that means a brief rally toward $500 remains possible.

The bigger risk, however, sits below the current price.

Cumulative long liquidation leverage is roughly $41 million if the ZEC price hits $380, at the lower end of the heatmap. In other words, substantially more leveraged long exposure remains vulnerable if ZEC reverses lower.

That creates a potentially dangerous sequence: ZEC rallies toward the $500 liquidity magnet, sweeps short positions, and then rejects from descending-channel resistance.

A subsequent break below the 50-day EMA near $455 could start liquidating overleveraged longs. The resulting forced selling may accelerate ZEC’s decline toward its 200-day EMA near $388 and, eventually, the $320-$340 channel target.