idk if this is the right mental model, but ecash via chaumian mints is just Bitcoin banks. The mint is a central, trusted issuer of bearer cash. The bank has to gain trust and a user base to make money, and the market it interacts with is bitcoin, not the financial markets.

So I think ecash of this variant is one of the better hopes for banks in cyberspace. The scenario would look something like dozens of mints choose to interoperate or not, creating an adhoc bank network for digital cash. Like nostr relays, they'll first be run by enthusiasts and amateurs, for fun. We'll eventually be able to offload all "instant payments" features from lightning to ecash, since paying is just copy paste a token. Mints will become highly sophisticated lightning nodes.

fwiw this sounds awfully close to Nik Bhatia's idea of "layered money". As others have noted, the anonset needs to grow for their to be a crowd to hide in, but I'm rooting for the return of wildcat banking with ecash.