A lot of talks recently around @namada and its very unique launch mechanism 👇 I’ve been tracking the @anoma ecosystem since before EthCC 2023, even got myself some nice merch after talking with the team. Namada’s (built by Anoma) Phase 5 (enabling $NAM IBC transfers) is a pivotal moment for privacy, data protection and infrastructure across cryptos. Quick recap on why Namada Matters (and how it goes beyond Zcash & Monero) If you’ve followed privacy coins like Zcash or Monero, you already understand the value of shielding your transactions from public view. But both are limited in scope: 🔹 Monero only protects $XMR (and very hard to purchase, swap and find) 🔹 Zcash only protects $ZEC 🔹 Namada shields any IBC-compatible asset (tradable on @osmosiszone) and soon ETH, SOL, USDC, NFTs, and more That makes Namada less like a standalone privacy coin, and more like a modular privacy layer with permissionless “privacy engine” that works across chains and assets. And it doesn’t stop at payments as Namada is designed to integrate privacy directly into wallets, dApps, DAOs, and DeFi. However, Namada is not a mixer, unlike Tornado Cash: 🔹 Namada is a layer-1 blockchain, not a smart contract 🔹 It offers native, chain-level privacy across multiple assets, not just $NAM 🔹 It uses a Multi-Asset Shielded Pool (MASP), enabling stronger anonymity than per-asset mixers (for large amounts it's "easy" to track mixer flows) 🔹 It’s composable, permissionless, and comes with built-in incentives to protect the network (shield your assets and get rewards) 🔹 It’s designed to integrate seamlessly with chains like Ethereum, Solana, and Cosmos; not exist in isolation like Monero and zCash. I think privacy is a really important topic as the nature of blockchains make every on-chain transaction tracable which cause problems for: - Whales having their wallets tracked, if you want to anonymize your assets, the main solution is to send to a centralized place. - Salaries, payments and net worth. Cryptos are problematic IRL as everyone can see your wallet balances and history, making it very unsafe to use for everyday payments (cf. kidnappings in France). With Ethereum and Solana support coming, you’ll soon be able to: 🔹 Send SOL → Namada → SOL, unlink both wallets 🔹 Bridge USDC from Ethereum, make a private payment, and exit on Cosmos or Solana 🔹 Swap shielded assets on Osmosis without leaking your transaction history The kind of unique thing with Namada is that you get rewarded for using privacy through their "shield for the yield” mechanism. It pays users $NAM tokens for depositing into the shielded pool and strengthening the system's privacy. With Phase 5 now live, Namada is planning to: 🔹 Add mobile wallet support 🔹 Expand shielded IBC routing 🔹 Launch native on/off-ramps 🔹 Support more L1s and appchains 🔹 Offer seamless DeFi integrations with privacy by default Personally quite excited about the upcoming developments, as Vitalik and others pointed out, privacy isn’t a feature, it’s a public good. Without it, self-sovereign finance is an illusion. I'll drop some updates once new chains will be added 🥂