Galaxy Digital (NASDAQ: GLXY) has launched a Bitcoin Quantum Readiness Initiative, committing up to USD$5 million to research, developer grants and technical guidance aimed at helping the cryptocurrency prepare for future quantum computing threats.
Announced on Tuesday, the program brings together funding for post-quantum cryptography research, software development and an advisory council as concerns grow that powerful quantum computers could eventually break the encryption protecting Bitcoin transactions. Additionally, the initiative seeks to connect quantum computing researchers with Bitcoin developers before the technology matures into a practical security risk.
Galaxy said the effort rests on three pillars. The company will fund developers working on quantum-resistant transaction proposals, post-quantum signature schemes, wallet migration tools and security audits. It will also expand Galaxy Research to publish technical analysis for investors, policymakers and the broader Bitcoin community. Meanwhile, a new Quantum Advisory Council will help guide research priorities and grant decisions.
Applications for the grant program opened immediately following the announcement.
Galaxy Head of Firmwide Research Alex Thorn said the initiative responds to a growing disconnect between two rapidly evolving fields. He said quantum computing researchers continue to make technical progress while much of the Bitcoin ecosystem has only recently begun seriously examining post-quantum cryptography. Consequently, Galaxy wants to help translate complex research into practical information for investors and decision-makers while supporting developers tackling the most difficult engineering challenges.
Founder and chief executive Mike Novogratz said Galaxy believes companies involved in digital assets should contribute to protecting Bitcoin from potential future quantum threats rather than waiting until the technology becomes an immediate concern.
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Concern centers on cryptography securing Bitcoin transactions
The advisory council initially includes Barry Sanders, scientific director of Quantum City at the University of Calgary, Damien Bérubé, an MIT Sea Grant Knauss Fellow, and Boston University computer science professor Eran Tromer.
Sanders said governments and major industries have already begun preparing for the long-term effects of quantum computing. He added that Bitcoin should advance similar preparations as development timelines continue to shorten.
The concern centers on the cryptography securing Bitcoin transactions. Today, Bitcoin relies on elliptic curve cryptography using the secp256k1 curve. Classical computers would require an impractical amount of time to calculate a private key from a public key, making the system effectively secure under current technology.
However, quantum computers operate differently from conventional machines. Instead of processing information only as binary ones and zeros, they use quantum states that allow certain calculations to proceed dramatically faster. Researchers believe sufficiently advanced quantum computers running Shor’s algorithm could eventually solve mathematical problems that currently protect Bitcoin’s private keys.
Current quantum computers remain far from reaching that capability. They contain relatively few stable quantum bits, or qubits, and produce high error rates that prevent large-scale cryptographic attacks. Nevertheless, researchers increasingly focus on preparing years before practical machines emerge because changing Bitcoin’s underlying cryptography would require broad agreement across the network.
That preparation gained new urgency earlier this year.
In March 2026, researchers from Google Quantum AI, the Ethereum Foundation and Stanford University published research suggesting that attacking Bitcoin’s secp256k1 encryption may require roughly an order of magnitude fewer quantum resources than previous estimates. Additionally, the paper modeled theoretical hardware capable of deriving a private key from a live Bitcoin transaction in about nine minutes.
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Risk varies across Bitcoin wallets
Bitcoin typically confirms transactions in roughly 10 minutes.
Under that theoretical scenario, an attacker could observe a transaction after it enters the public network, calculate the corresponding private key before confirmation and broadcast a competing transaction carrying a higher transaction fee. Consequently, miners might include the attacker’s transaction instead of the original one, allowing the attacker to redirect the funds.
Researchers often describe this as an on-spend attack.
Unlike many cybersecurity risks, the attacker would not need to collect encrypted information for years before breaking it. Instead, the attack depends on exploiting a brief window after a Bitcoin transaction becomes publicly visible but before the blockchain permanently confirms it.
The risk also varies across Bitcoin wallets.
According to the Google research, approximately 6.9 million bitcoin, roughly one-third of the circulating supply, already reside in addresses whose public keys have appeared permanently on the blockchain. Those include early Pay-to-Public-Key addresses and wallets that previously spent funds. Furthermore, about 1.7 million bitcoin associated with older Pay-to-Public-Key addresses, including holdings commonly attributed to Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, have exposed public keys that remained visible for more than a decade.
Unlike banks or technology companies, Bitcoin cannot simply replace historical cryptographic records. Every transaction remains permanently recorded on the blockchain. This leaves previously exposed public keys available for future analysis if quantum computers eventually become powerful enough.
Industry participants have already begun developing defensive measures.
Privately held BitGo recently introduced quantum risk management features for institutional Bitcoin custody. The company added a Quantum Risk Score along with updated controls governing unspent transaction outputs. These are designed to reduce unnecessary public key exposure.
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Developers have proposed changes to Bitcoin protocol
Meanwhile, privately held Blockstream identified post-quantum cryptography as one of its major engineering priorities in its second-quarter 2026 report.
Research organization Project Eleven also attempted to estimate when practical quantum attacks could emerge. The group identified 2033 as its baseline projection. It also estimated an optimistic timeline as early as 2024 and a pessimistic scenario around 2030. Those forecasts remain speculative because researchers still disagree on how quickly quantum hardware will improve.
Developers have also proposed changes directly to the Bitcoin protocol.
Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 360 introduces a new address format called Pay-to-Merkle-Root that would avoid exposing public keys directly on the blockchain during normal transactions. Additionally, Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 361 outlines a three-stage migration plan that would eventually freeze coins held in wallets that never upgrade to quantum-resistant addresses.
Jameson Lopp and five co-authors introduced BIP-361 in April 2026. However, the proposal remains controversial within the Bitcoin development community. This is because any fundamental protocol change requires broad agreement among developers, miners and node operators.
That consensus process often moves slowly. Previous Bitcoin upgrades have required years of technical review, public debate and gradual adoption before activation across the network.
Galaxy argues that timeline creates its own challenge. The company believes waiting until quantum computers become capable of attacking Bitcoin would leave insufficient time for developers to coordinate a network-wide migration.
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Trump’s executive orders accelerate American quantum tech
Government policy has also shifted toward earlier preparation.
On June 22, 2026, U.S. President Donald Trump signed executive orders intended to accelerate American quantum technology development while establishing federal deadlines for adopting post-quantum cryptography. Additionally, the orders require agencies to transition key establishment systems by Dec. 31, 2030, and digital signature systems by Dec. 31, 2031.
Although no cryptographically relevant quantum computer exists today, Galaxy said preparing well before that milestone remains essential. That’s Bitcoin’s decentralized governance structure makes major security upgrades inherently gradual.
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