Article: Nancy, PANews
Recently, the overall crypto market has weakened, with most assets erasing their gains for the year in the short term. Surprisingly, a group of “old faces” that have gone through multiple cycles have risen against the trend during liquidity tightening. These narratives have long been disenchanted by the market and have also sparked concerns about a “doomsday chariot” market.
This article by PANews summarizes 11 well-performing veteran projects recently, which, as of November 11, have averaged a 55.3% increase over the past 30 days. Notably, ZEC, ICP, and others have performed exceptionally well, recovering from the sharp declines seen on October 11. However, compared to their all-time highs, these assets are still down approximately 90%. Behind these “old trees sprouting new shoots,” there are not only market hype but also multiple factors such as technological upgrades, ecosystem development, and token empowerment supporting their contrarian performance.
Zcash (ZEC)
Zcash has been a major driver of the recent privacy hype. According to CoinGecko data, ZEC has surged 151.2% over the past 30 days, reaching a new high since January 2018, but still down about 79.1% from its all-time peak.
Market attention has increased partly due to public endorsements from figures like Silicon Valley angel investor Naval and BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes. Meanwhile, Zcash’s product and ecosystem developments have also contributed to the price rally. In October, Grayscale announced that its Zcash Trust fund opened private placements to accredited investors; in November, Zcash developer ECC released its Q4 roadmap, focusing on reducing technical debt, improving user privacy and usability with Zashi, and ensuring smooth management of development funds; subsequently, the Zcash Foundation launched a new official website to strengthen privacy finance infrastructure.
Additionally, Zcash’s second halving in November 2024, which reduces block rewards and limits new supply, has also provided some price support.
Dash (DASH)
According to CoinGecko data, DASH has increased approximately 104.5% over the past 30 days, reaching a new high since December 2021, but still down 94.6% from its all-time high. Dash stated that its recent good performance is not accidental but rooted in long-term fundamentals. Major achievements in recent years include the release of DashSpend, in-depth research on billing payments, comprehensive improvements to confidential payments, DEX support (added to Maya Protocol), and the launch of the decentralized application platform Evolution.
Monero (XMR)
With privacy narratives gaining market attention, Monero’s popularity has surged. According to CoinGecko, XMR has risen 43.6% over the past 30 days, reaching a new high since May 2021, but still down 22.7% from its all-time peak.
In October, Monero released the significant Fluorine Fermi upgrade, greatly enhancing protection against “spy nodes.” It has also rolled out software and wallet updates, hosted multiple technical, research, and community meetings, and continued to promote its Community Proposal System (CCS).
NEAR Protocol (NEAR)
According to CoinGecko, NEAR has increased 20.6% over the past month but remains 85.5% below its all-time high.
Last month, NEAR Protocol announced that the House of Stake is officially live on the mainnet, allowing users to lock NEAR tokens to gain governance rights and rewards. The ecosystem revival has also been driven by the Near Intents transaction framework, supporting cross-chain native transactions, instant settlement, and AI-friendly features. Its total transaction volume has reached $4.5 billion, with nearly $1.1 billion traded in the past 7 days and total fees of $8.2 million.
Regarding tokens, a recent proposal to halve NEAR’s annual inflation rate to 2.5% did not meet the voting threshold and was not approved. However, the core team still plans to incorporate this inflation reduction into upcoming protocol upgrades. Moreover, Nasdaq-listed shipping company OceanPal announced in October that it completed a $120 million PIPE to establish a wholly owned subsidiary, SovereignAI, in partnership with the NEAR Foundation to develop NEAR-based encrypted financial vaults and confidential AI cloud platforms.
Internet Computer (ICP)
Driven by AI product developments, Internet Computer has regained market attention. CoinGecko data shows ICP has surged 111.1% over the past 30 days, reaching a high for the year but still down 99% from its all-time high.
Recently, DFINITY Foundation released updates for the DeAI platform Caffeine running on ICP, now open to the public. This product allows users to quickly generate, deploy, and iterate complete Web3 applications through natural language chat without programming skills.
Uniswap
On November 11, with the launch of proposals for protocol fee activation and UNI token burn mechanisms, UNI’s price surged. CoinGecko data shows UNI increased 43.6% over the past 30 days, but remains 80.4% below its all-time high.
On November 11, Uniswap Labs and the Uniswap Foundation jointly proposed the “UNIfication Proposal,” aiming to activate protocol fee mechanisms, implement UNI token burns, and establish a Uniswap growth fund. The goal is to unify incentives across the entire Uniswap ecosystem, making the protocol a default decentralized exchange (DEX) for tokenized value.
Filecoin (FIL)
CoinGecko data indicates FIL has risen approximately 51.5% over the past 30 days, reaching a nearly 8-month high but still down about 98.9% from its all-time peak.
Filecoin is integrating AI and DePIN narratives, accelerating its transition from decentralized storage to on-chain cloud services. Over the past month, it has focused on infrastructure and ecosystem development, emphasizing data storage, cross-chain interoperability, and fee optimization. For example, in October, Filecoin Pin was officially released, supporting one-click anchoring of IPFS content to the Filecoin chain for encrypted, verifiable persistent storage, with CLI and GitHub Actions integration to lower developer barriers. After the v26 network upgrade, gas fees were halved, leading to growth in daily new storage contracts and active contracts. The ecosystem fund injected 500,000 FIL (worth millions of dollars) into over 200 projects via RetroPGF-3. Recently, Filecoin hinted at transforming from a storage network to an on-chain cloud service supporting on-chain data retrieval and computation, with an official page launched and whitelist applications open. It also partnered with Akave Cloud to launch a decentralized object storage service compatible with S3 interfaces, aiding enterprises and DePIN projects in migrating to blockchain storage.
Arweave (AR)
With rapid expansion of AI applications and accelerated global data center infrastructure, demand for high-performance storage chips has surged, boosting storage-related ecosystems. Projects like Arweave have attracted funding attention. CoinGecko shows AR has increased about 31.7% over the past 30 days, reaching a 3-month high but still down roughly 93.8% from its all-time high.
Starknet (STRK)
Recently, with the rise of zero-knowledge proof (ZK) technology and privacy tracks, Starknet has gained market attention. Notably, both Starknet and Zcash co-founders are Eli Ben-Sasson, which has further boosted its visibility. CoinGecko data shows STRK has risen approximately 50.3% over the past 30 days but remains 96.1% below its all-time high.
In terms of technology and ecosystem activities, Starknet has been active recently. For example, it launched the Bitcoin yield product Starknet Earn and started beta testing; Circle’s native USDC and CCTP V2 announced deployment on Starknet; Starkware released a new version, Starknet v0.14.1; and it announced the deployment of its next-generation open-source proof system, S-two, on Starknet mainnet, claiming it to be the fastest and most privacy-preserving proof system in production.
ZKsync (ZK)
Recently, ZKsync has attracted attention due to endorsement from Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and its ZK technology. CoinGecko shows ZK has increased about 39.8% over the past 30 days but remains 82.8% below its all-time high.
Technologically, ZKsync recently launched the Atlas upgrade of ZK Stack, introducing high-performance sequencers to enable sub-second transaction confirmation and faster cross-chain settlement. This provides a faster and more flexible infrastructure for enterprises and institutions migrating their operations to blockchain.
Regarding tokens, ZKsync founder Alex proposed a major update to the tokenomics model. Moving forward, the ZK token will no longer be solely for governance; its core mechanism will involve using all network revenue to buy back and burn ZK tokens, fostering a self-reinforcing, sustainable economic system for ZKsync.
Neo (NEO)
CoinGecko data shows NEO has increased 16.1% over the past 30 days, down 97.3% from its all-time high. Over the past month, Neo has made progress on multiple fronts, including deploying the NEO X mainnet v0.4.2 upgrade, which introduced protections against MEV (maximal extractable value) exploitation; officially shutting down the Legacy mainnet; opening the Neo X core codebase to the community; and recently launching the Scoop AI Hackathon jointly with SpoonOS.
