This should be the biggest news in the crypto world today. Google has just sounded the highest alert in the cryptocurrency industry.

This time, it's not an emotional bearish signal, but rather bringing a distant issue directly into focus.
Google's latest paper doesn't present a "possibility" but a pathway: quantum computing cracking Bitcoin, not in 2035, but potentially as early as 2029.
Previously, industry consensus was that quantum cracking would take several months.
Google's latest model has cut the required computing power by 90%.
Now, only 1,200 logical qubits are needed to complete the calculation.
The top 1,000 richest Ethereum wallets could be looted within 9 days. The time to crack private keys could be reduced to 9 minutes.
Bitcoin block time is 10 minutes, and this 1-minute difference means that while a transaction is still in the mempool, the private key could be reverse-engineered and stolen.
The risks are not evenly distributed: addresses with exposed public keys are the primary targets. Old addresses that haven't moved in a long time, and ancient miner addresses, are actually the most dangerous. The millions of "sleeping BTC" on-chain are essentially transparent assets.
Google did not release attack code this time; instead, they only performed zero-knowledge verification. This move is unusual, essentially implying a presumption—that the capability has already been demonstrated, just not widely disseminated.
So, the key point of this matter isn't whether quantum computers exist now, but that the time window has already been locked.
2029 is roughly the middle to late stage of the next cycle, meaning the industry has only a few years left to upgrade underlying cryptography.
Conservative systems like Bitcoin will face even greater pressure; Ethereum is already attempting transition solutions, essentially racing against time.
Many will see this as bearish news, but it’s more like a "certain variable" coming into play:
Anti-quantum measures are shifting from a fringe narrative to a mainstream one.
Who solves the security problem first will command a premium.
Those still stuck in the old system will eventually be priced out.