Glassnode: 6 Million BTC Worth ~$500B Has Exposed Public Keys — Quantum Risk Is Real, But Nuanced

Fresh on-chain research from Glassnode puts a striking number on the table: 6.04 million BTC — roughly 30% of circulating supply — already has its public cryptographic keys exposed on-chain. At current prices, that's approximately $469–500 billion in theoretically vulnerable holdings, split between 1.92 million BTC in structural exposure (legacy P2PK outputs, early Satoshi-era coins, Taproot outputs) and 4.12 million BTC in operational exposure caused by address reuse.

The attack vector is Shor's algorithm, a quantum computing method that could in theory derive a private key from a known public key — no new transaction required. The structural bucket is partly mitigated by the likelihood that many of those coins are permanently immovable. The operational bucket of 4.12 million BTC is both larger and, critically, avoidable with better address hygiene.