Dragonfly Crypto Partners managing partner Haseeb Qureshi called for winding down the Zcash developer fund once it expires under current rules in 2028, arguing the $95 million treasury is large enough to complete remaining protocol work.
"I'm of the opinion that this should be the final Dev Fund," Qureshi wrote on X Friday, adding that the fund risks becoming "politicized" as its value approaches $100 million.
The Zcash development fund — also known as the lockbox — held 63,962 ZEC tokens worth approximately $95 million at press time, according to ZecStats data. Under the NU6 upgrade, the fund accrues 0.1875 ZEC per block, representing 12% of the block subsidy. Its balance sits outside circulation until disbursement through governance.
Not all industry figures agreed with Qureshi's position. Paradigm founder Matt Huang argued on Wednesday that the fund remains critical "in this age of AI cyber capabilities" and rapid quantum computing progress. Huang said he supported Qureshi's view that pure token-holder voting was not the right path but cautioned that abandoning the fund entirely could erode trust in Zcash as a monetary asset.
Huang proposed a hybrid governance model that would combine token-holder input with additional forms of oversight.
Qureshi also indicated support for a partial model in which token holders would elect temporary councils rather than exercise direct voting control, rather than moving toward "pure token holder voting."
Maxime Desalle, investment analyst at Winklevoss Capital, took a more drastic stance, writing on Thursday that the community should "completely get rid" of the development fund to resolve ongoing governance disputes. In a Sept. 9 post, Desalle had argued the fund could undermine Zcash's security while recreating bureaucratic dependencies comparable to those seen in welfare states.
Zcash founder Zooko Wilcox defended the existing framework, saying on Sept. 1 that the Zcash Community Grants Committee was among the primary reasons the protocol "has survived and grown to where it is today." He later clarified on Sept. 14 that the committee accounts for only 40% of the development fund, suggesting the broader treasury remains subject to competing governance pressures.
The debate comes amid recent governance activity in which Zcash holders backed a move to 25-second block times and voted to maintain the existing ZEC halving schedule.
