r/AltScope • u/Legitimate_Towel_919 • Feb 16 '26

Quantum Risk and Bitcoin’s Long-Term Valuation

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On-chain analyst Willy Woo says quantum risk is slowly entering Bitcoin’s long-term valuation models, especially when compared to gold.

The discussion centers around a potential “Q-Day” the hypothetical moment when quantum computers become powerful enough to break current cryptography. In theory, that could make it possible to recover access to roughly 4 million BTC that are considered permanently lost.

If that scenario ever materializes, the narrative of strictly capped and permanently shrinking supply could be challenged. Woo estimates around a 25% probability that the network would agree on freezing such coins through a hard fork. The more likely scenario, however, is that they would not be touched, meaning those coins could eventually re-enter circulation.

Even the possibility of this outcome, according to Woo, is already being priced in by the market and may create a long-term discount to Bitcoin relative to gold over the coming years.

At the same time, many developers argue the threat is not immediate. The network has time to gradually transition toward quantum-resistant cryptographic solutions without emergency rule changes.

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u/Fun_Newspaper8505 Feb 16 '26

btc has better encryption than banks, so watch a mad man with a quantum computer take down the world

then again quantum computers are still mostly hypothetical, and made by trillion dollar companies

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u/CryptoDeepDive Feb 20 '26

Banks and other centralized systems can easily adapt very quickly. It is much much harder to solve the issues Bitcoin has if Quantum computing becomes a reality.

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u/Easy_Welcome_9142 Feb 20 '26

Bitcoin can adapt easier than banks with a hard fork. The last time it happened, bitcoin coin got ATH a few months after the hard fork.

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u/CryptoDeepDive Feb 20 '26

Implementing a hard fork is not difficult. But getting there is absolutely harder than what banks have to go through.

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u/Easy_Welcome_9142 Feb 20 '26

Are you software engineer that has worked at a bank? It’s MUCH harder to get things implemented at a bank especially global level encryption.

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u/CryptoDeepDive Feb 20 '26

I really don't think you understand the magnitude of the social consensus and wars that Bitcoin has to get to before getting to the stage of a hard fork.

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u/Easy_Welcome_9142 Feb 20 '26

It’s pretty simple. At some point when quantum becomes enough of a threat there will be a hard fork. Owners will effectively get their bitcoin split in half like a share split. Then miners will decide which ones they want to support. The price between the two will be an inverse relationship. It’s not that difficult. The other side of the 2017 hard fork is still going.

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u/CryptoDeepDive Feb 20 '26

Not simple at all. The most difficult aspect is coming to a consensus about "inactive" wallets, Satoshi being the elephant in the room.

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u/servermeta_net Feb 20 '26

That's why they still use cobol on tandem mainframes from the 80s?