Overview
- The research places cryptographically relevant quantum machines at least a decade away, requiring millions of fault‑tolerant qubits versus today’s roughly 105‑qubit devices such as Google’s Willow.
- Roughly 1.6–1.7 million BTC sit in legacy P2PK addresses, but most are dispersed across more than 32,000 small UTXOs, making large, fast thefts impractical.
- Modern address types keep public keys concealed until spending, which limits exposure and would require an attacker to solve computations within minutes to intercept live transactions.
- CoinShares recommends a phased migration to post‑quantum signatures through routine upgrades and warns that premature hard forks or untested schemes could introduce bugs or fragmentation.
- Commentators note that a quantum capability strong enough to break Bitcoin’s signatures would also threaten banking systems, government secrets, and military communications.