CZ Proposes Freezing Satoshi's 1.1 Million Bitcoin Over Quantum Threat

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) has proposed freezing roughly 1.1 million BTC belonging to Bitcoin's anonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto. The idea stems from concern that future quantum computers could break the network's cryptography and steal those coins before anyone else gets the chance. The proposal immediately split the industry into two camps.

What exactly did CZ propose?

Zhao floated the idea a month ago during a podcast with Galaxy Digital's Alex Thorn. Under his plan, Satoshi's wallets would get six to twelve months to move the funds on their own. If the coins remain untouched, the community could then collectively decide whether to freeze those addresses for good.

At Bitcoin's current price near $62,000, that stash is worth about $68 billion. Satoshi's wallets have not moved in nearly 17 years, since the earliest Bitcoin blocks were mined back in 2009. Zhao's core worry is simple: if someone else cracks the private key first, over a million BTC could hit the market at once and crash the price.

Why is Bitcoin vulnerable to quantum attacks in the first place?

A regular computer cannot calculate a wallet's private key from a public address alone. A sufficiently powerful quantum computer theoretically could, but only if that address's public key has ever been exposed on the blockchain.

• Core issue: The biggest risk applies to old P2PK-format addresses, where the public key is visible right away, with no need to wait for a transaction.
• Part of Satoshi's coins sit on exactly these early addresses from 2009-2010.
• Estimates of when sufficiently powerful quantum machines will exist vary widely, from a few years to several decades.
• Developer Jameson Lopp proposed BIP-361, a phased migration to quantum-resistant cryptography with deadlines for wallets, exchanges and custodians.

Lopp himself said back in April that freezing Satoshi's hoard and millions of other long-dormant coins would be better than waiting for hackers to steal them. So his position is more nuanced than a flat rejection of CZ's idea.

Who's against it, and why?

Investor Michael Terpin, sometimes called crypto's godfather for his role in the industry's early days back in 2013, called Zhao's proposal a dangerous precedent. In his view, freezing someone else's coins contradicts Bitcoin's whole premise as a permissionless system where no one decides for anyone else.

"If we don't do anything with it, then we're basically giving it to somebody who's going to hack it."

- Changpeng Zhao (CZ), Binance founder, from a podcast with Alex Thorn (Galaxy Digital), June 2026

Terpin also doubts a decentralized community could ever agree on such a move. Rolling out SegWit took years of debate on its own, and this touches a far more sensitive question about someone else's property.

Is there a middle ground?

Bitwise chief investment officer Matt Hougan rejects both extremes, freezing the coins and doing nothing at all. He favors an idea from Castle Island Ventures partner Nic Carter: place Satoshi's coins into a legal trust until someone proves ownership through historical electronic records.

Hougan notes that the market has long priced these coins as permanently unavailable anyway, so any change in status would create more risk than benefit. In his words, no scenario involving Satoshi's wallet looks positive for the industry.

What comes next?

For now, the debate stays largely theoretical. Researchers keep working on post-quantum cryptography for Bitcoin, while the Ethereum network is already testing its own defenses against future attacks. There is still no consensus on concrete next steps for Bitcoin.

If the quantum threat turns real before the network manages to prepare, the fate of Satoshi's wallets and other old dormant addresses will decide just how painful the transition ends up being for BTC's price and investor trust.