BlackRock, Coinbase, and Strategy Back a $15 Million Bitcoin Quantum Defense Fund

Nine of the biggest names in finance and crypto formed the Bitcoin Security Consortium, pledging a combined $15 million over three years to fund Bitcoin security research and open-source development focused on quantum computing defense.

The members are BlackRock, Coinbase, Strategy, Anchorage Digital, ARK Invest, Block, Blockstream, Fidelity Digital Assets, and Galaxy. The consortium won’t hold or allocate the money, each member picks which developers and researchers to fund directly, and the group says it will not direct Bitcoin development or take positions on protocol changes. Mike Schmidt of the developer-funding nonprofit Brink will coordinate on a volunteer basis. BlackRock’s head of digital assets, Robert Mitchnick, said Core developers “do incredibly important work” and that the group would make more funding available for Bitcoin’s long-term security.

Quantum computers capable of breaking Bitcoin’s cryptography don’t exist today. But roughly 6.9M BTC ($450B) sit in addresses that would be vulnerable if one arrives, and any fix requires coordinating changes across wallets, exchanges, miners, and users, which takes years. That’s why work is starting now on proposals like BIP 360, a new output type designed to limit public key exposure, alongside post-quantum signature schemes.

It makes sense for this particular group to back quantum defense research. BlackRock runs the largest spot Bitcoin ETF, alongside Fidelity and ARK. Strategy is the biggest DAT and holds 843,775 coins. Coinbase custodies much of the institutional supply and most of their products revolve around crypto trading. These firms have billions in client and shareholder exposure to an asset whose long-term security is now something they have to answer for—which makes funding Core developers cheap insurance.

It’s been widely known that the quantum risk to Bitcoin is a massive overhang for the foreseeable future, and many investors have come out and flatly said Bitcoin is not investable until quantum is solved. Many don’t believe the core BTC devs can move fast enough (and reach agreement) to make the type of changes needed to solve quantum in time. Enter those with the most skin in the game. If anyone can get it done, it’s likely this group…

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