A few months ago, I was setting up a simple yield position with tokenized assets. It was not anything fancy; I was just putting some stable value into a protocol that promised returns that were easy to follow. But halfway through, the privacy features kicked in in a strange way: one step required manual disclosures that seemed unnecessary, another step took longer because the chain could not handle the proof generation smoothly, and the whole thing cost more in fees than I had planned for a low-stakes move. I have traded infrastructure tokens and worked with bridges for years, so this was not the first time I had run into this problem. It made me realize that even "private" networks often make users go through clunky workflows where secrecy is not smooth—it is an afterthought that slows everything down or leaves traces you did not expect.

The issue is that most blockchains see privacy as an extra feature instead of an important part of the transaction flow. When developers make financial apps, they have to deal with tools that show too much information during settlements or that need extra steps to hide it. When there are a lot of proofs, costs go up, and when the load is high, reliability goes down. People are worried about the uncertainty: will this transfer stay private without raising fees, or will a spike in activity show patterns through timing? Business is a pain in the neck because settlements that should happen in seconds take longer, and compliance checks that should be automated become manual tasks. This is not only a waste of time; it also keeps real-world finance from fully moving on-chain, where speed, privacy, and auditability need to be balanced without users having to do anything all the time.

It is like keeping track of patient files in a hospital. Doctors need information to help their patients, but they can only share the most important information. The rest must be sent with encryption. You do not have to approve every view again because the system keeps track of disclosures as part of the workflow. This keeps things moving along while still keeping privacy safe. Without that, paperwork slows down care, just like broken privacy tech slows down money management.

This project is different from most because it focuses on making privacy a part of regulated finance, while most others focus on making things more scalable. It works like a layer-1 chain that is best for private smart contracts. Zero-knowledge proofs only share certain pieces of information, so parties can check compliance without giving away any details. It values finality and auditability the most: transactions settle in a way that is certain, and there are built-in proofs that let regulators see them if they want to. It does not add any unnecessary features, and it only works with EVM so that developers can use the same Solidity tools without having to change them for privacy reasons. That matters for how people use it because it makes disclosure a part of the process. For instance, apps that tokenize securities can work with built-in privacy, which makes them less scary for businesses. In early January 2026, when the mainnet went live, the network began to process these proofs more smoothly. The new Chainlink integration from January 19 made it easier for real-world assets to work together. This meant that cross-chain data feeds could start private settlements without any leaks.

One part of the implementation is the Segregated Byzantine Agreement consensus, or SBA. It divides the agreement phases so that blocks are confirmed in about 2–3 seconds on average, as shown by the explorer's recent block data. Even when there is not much going on, this speed stays the same without rollups. Because of this trade-off, memes will not get as much attention for their TPS, but financial throughput will be more stable. There will be a limit of 100–200 TPS to make sure that proof generation does not get too difficult. Another feature that was added to the Rusk VM in November 2025 is Succinct Attestation. It compresses ZK proofs for on-chain verification, which lets you do things like secure stake delegations without letting voters know who they are. It has been active in the 204 provisioners that are currently online and has handled over 206 million DUSK in stakes so far.

The token DUSK works well in this setup. It pays for the transaction fees for signing private contracts and keeping proof, and it burns coins like EIP-1559 to keep the supply low when there are a lot of transactions. But right now, the network does not use much gas per block, and sometimes it does not use any gas at all when it is not busy. Staking has to do with security because holders lock it up to become provisioners and get rewards from the emission schedule, which starts high to get people to join but goes down over time. There are no slashing penalties, which makes more people want to get involved, but it only works because of money. Settlement uses it to finish blocks, and the amount of staked coins changes the weight of the consensus. Governance comes in through upgrade proposals, such as the recent multilayer evolution in June 2025, which separated execution from privacy layers. It all works, and there are no extra features like required burns or complicated yields.

The circulating supply is 500 million, and daily trading volumes have been hitting new highs lately because of privacy rotations. According to exchange data, futures open interest hit $47.94 million last week. This shows some interest in speculation, but it is not the main story.

When you trade this often, it is mostly about riding waves like the 583% spike over 30 days that ended in mid-January. This spike was caused by excitement about the mainnet and partnerships. But the price can change a lot if people's feelings change. When small unlocks happen or the market cools down, I have seen similar tokens lose 30–40% of their value. Volatility is one part of the story about privacy coins going up, but it leaves out the quieter part: as people get used to using it all the time, like when institutions settle RWAs through DuskEVM, the infrastructure value will show itself. This could lead to a steady demand for fees and staking. But it is happening slowly. The network's current low throughput—recent blocks have an average of 0-1 transactions, and there have been just over 3.25 million transactions since launch—shows that it is still in the early stages of adoption. This means that reliable workflows could lead to value that stays stable over time instead of quick changes.

That being said, there are real dangers. If chains like Monero or even Ethereum's ZK layers make it easier to integrate without worrying about rules, developers might leave. Dusk's narrow focus on compliance might make it less appealing in fields where rules are not as strict. Some people are still not sure if RWA tokenization will reach the expected €300 million through partners like NPEX, especially since MiCA has been fully enforced since July 2025. If issuers are not sure, network activity might stay low. One possible failure mode I have thought about is this: if a lot of high-value private trades come in all at once, like from a tokenized bond issuance, the ZK proof queue gets too full because of limits on how many trades can be executed at once. This makes settlements take longer than the usual two seconds and causes bridged assets to not have enough cash. This could cause arbitrages to fail and people to lose faith in the process. There is also a lot of uncertainty about how provisioner participation will change if there are no penalties. For instance, if economic rewards go down during a bear market, the 204 active ones might work together, which would make decentralization weaker.

Ultimately, these concepts of privacy as a process serve as a reminder to me that infrastructure is not a one-time event. It manifests as recurring transactions, where customers return because the workflow simply functions rather than because of the hype. The mainnet is still new, and things are slowly starting to happen. We will have to wait and see if this becomes a popular choice for regulated flows or if it fades away.

@Dusk #Dusk $DUSK