Arthur Hayes Goes Max Risk On Hype, Zec, And Near

@CryptoHayes, the BitMEX co-founder who serves as chief investment officer of crypto fund Maelstrom, has declared the bull market back and is positioning his portfolio accordingly. In a Substack essay published this week, Hayes named $HYPE, $ZEC, and $NEAR as his top altcoin picks and said he is taking the fund to maximum risk exposure.

Bitcoin Target and Altcoin Positioning

Hayes said Bitcoin found a bottom at $60,000 earlier this year, and retaking its October 2025 record of $126,000 is a "foregone conclusion." He flagged $90,000 as the level at which the rally would turn explosive, at which point writers of call options with higher strike prices would be forced to buy Bitcoin to cover their positions, accelerating the advance.

The fund holds large positions in Hyperliquid's $HYPE token and Zcash's $ZEC, with $NEAR identified as the next pick. The $NEAR thesis, which Hayes said he will explain in a follow-up essay, rests on the combination of the privacy narrative and the protocol's intent-based architecture creating a positive cash flow. Hayes has also set an ambitious price target for $ZEC. He revealed that Zcash has become Maelstrom's second-largest liquid holding after Bitcoin, describing it as "Bitcoin with full privacy" and suggesting $ZEC could reach 10% to 20% of Bitcoin's value in the current cycle.

Hayes also flagged two scenarios that could end the rally: an irresponsible mega-AI IPO or merger that the market cannot absorb, and a Democratic challenger in the 2028 U.S. presidential election running on an anti-AI platform that forces lenders to reconsider credit flows to the sector.

ZEC Call Lands Alongside a Wave of Institutional Moves

The timing of Hayes' $ZEC call is notable. Grayscale is pushing a Zcash spot ETF into the U.S. regulatory pipeline, having filed a Form S-3 with the SEC to convert its existing Zcash Trust into a spot exchange-traded fund, with plans for it to trade on NYSE Arca under the ticker ZCSH. The ETF push comes after the SEC closed its Zcash Foundation probe without recommending enforcement action.

The ETF filing helped fuel a sharp rally in $ZEC, with the token surging from below $420 to nearly $640 before cooling back toward the $550 area. Even after the pullback, ZEC remained up roughly 33% over seven days, keeping its market cap near $9.31 billion and maintaining its position as the largest privacy-focused cryptocurrency.

On the $HYPE side, the week also brought a separate milestone. 21Shares debuted the first Hyperliquid ETF on Nasdaq under the ticker THYP, giving traditional investors regulated access to the decentralized exchange token for the first time. Hayes had previously predicted at the WebX Summit that $HYPE would surge 126x by 2028, referring to Hyperliquid as a decentralized Binance that could capture a Binance-level trading share.

Sources
CoinDesk: Arthur Hayes says Bitcoin will reclaim $126,000
Crypto.news: Grayscale files Zcash ETF as privacy coin demand returns
Cryptonomist: Grayscale Zcash spot ETF filing could test SEC privacy-coin stance