ZIP: XXX
Title: Zcash Shielded Asset (ZSA) Issuance
Owners: Daniel Benarroch <[email protected]>
				Pablo Kogan <[email protected]>
Credits: Shahaf Nacshon
				 Vivek Arte
				 Aurel Nicolas
Status: Draft
Category: Consensus
Created: 2022-03-10
License: MIT

Terminology

The key words "MUST" and "MAY" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119. [1]

The term "network upgrade" in this document is to be interpreted as described in ZIP 200 [2].

The term "Orchard" in this document is to be interpreted as described in ZIP 224 [3].

We define the following additional terms:

• Asset: A type of note that can be transferred on the Zcash block chain. ZEC is the default (and currently the only defined) asset for the Zcash mainnet.
• Orchard Shielded Asset: an asset with issuance defined on the Zcash block chain, and belonging to the Orchard anonymity pool.
• Wrapped Asset: an asset with native issuance defined outside the Zcash block chain.

Abstract

This ZIP does not aim to cover the transfer mechanism of the Zcash Shielded Assets (ZSA) protocol, but this and the ZSA Transfer ZIPs should be seen to work in conjunction.

Motivation

One of the directions for unleashing Zcash’ potential is to enable a multi-asset protocol on chain in order to develop more functionality for the ecosystem. Initially, as part of the grant funding this project, we are focusing on developing the underlying layer that will be used to build those applications.

Overview & Rationale

This ZIP specifies the issuance mechanism of the Zcash Shielded Assets (ZSA) protocol. In fact, the ZSA protocol has two main components: the transfer and issuance. The two ZIPs must work in conjunction, as the issuance mechanism is only valid for the ZSA transfer protocol, as it produces notes that can only be transferred under ZSA.

In short, we are going to enable only transparent issuance, since we believe that as a first step, transparency is important to properly test the applications that will be most used in the Zcash ecosystem. In essence, any user of the blockchain can issue new asset types, yet only a single issuer (a set of keys) can issue that specific asset type, as the asset identifiers are tied to the issuer keys.

The issuance mechanism will

The protocol described below enables a meaningful range of applications: