Galaxy Digital launches Bitcoin quantum readiness initiative with up to $5 million in grants

Galaxy Digital pledged up to $5 million on July 21 for a Bitcoin Quantum Readiness Initiative aimed at moving post-quantum security work from research into reviewed code and migration tooling before quantum computing becomes a practical threat. The program is designed to support review of quantum-resistant transaction proposals, post-quantum signature integration, formal security audits, and software and institutional migration tools, alongside a quantum advisory council. The effort reflects concern that a sufficiently powerful quantum computer could eventually use Shor's algorithm to recover a private key from an exposed elliptic-curve public key and forge a valid signature. That risk has two windows: keys already visible onchain could face long-term exposure, while most Bitcoin spends also reveal a public key in the mempool before confirmation, creating a shorter but potentially exploitable window. Draft BIP 360 identifies pay-to-public-key, bare multisignature and Taproot outputs among those exposed for long periods, while address reuse, extended public keys and wallet descriptors can also reveal vulnerable material. The proposal would use a soft fork to add a new Pay-to-Merkle-Root output, or P2MR, that removes Taproot’s key path and leaves room for stronger signature schemes later, though it remains a draft and addresses only the first exposure window. A second draft, BIP 361, sketches a roughly five-year, two-phase transition after activation, but depends on a still-unspecified post-quantum signature proposal and is only one scenario rather than an adopted roadmap. Galaxy argues the harder problem is coordination rather than cryptography alone, because any upgrade would require years of design, review, testing and adoption by developers, miners, node operators, wallets, exchanges, custodians and users. That view aligns with broader post-quantum planning beyond crypto: NIST finalized three post-quantum standards in August 2024, including two for digital signatures, and Executive Order 14412 directs the Office of Management and Budget to require specified federal systems to use post-quantum signatures by Dec. 31, 2031.