Capriole Investments founder Charles Edwards says Bitcoin may be positioned for a sharp upside repricing if the network shows tangible progress on post-quantum security. Speaking on Bitcoin Suisse AG’s podcast with Dominic Weibel and Luca Gnos, Edwards argued that Bitcoin’s recent underperformance, weak sentiment and institutional hesitation suggest quantum risk may already be partly reflected in the market.

Edwards framed the current setup as one of the strongest Bitcoin opportunity zones in months, but with a major caveat. In his view, Bitcoin has “completely flipped the script” after a nine-month downtrend, showing relative strength against equities and gold even as geopolitical risk, oil-market concerns and macro uncertainty remain elevated.

“Bitcoin, which has been in a massive downtrend for the last nine months completely flipped the script in the last two, three weeks,” Edwards said. “Those are very strong signals that you usually only get every couple of years in my experience.”

Quantum Risk Is Now Central To Bitcoin

The central variable, according to Edwards, is no longer the traditional four-year cycle, miner supply or even short-term macro volatility. It is whether Bitcoin can show credible movement toward quantum-resistant signatures before the perceived threat window tightens further.

Edwards said he remains constructive on Bitcoin as an investment because the asset has already been heavily discounted. But he was blunt about the longer-term risk if Bitcoin Core contributors and the broader ecosystem continue to treat quantum security as a distant issue.

“I’m constructive and optimistic from an investor point of view because we had such a big discount,” he said. “Today it’s fully priced in the risk and more so. For me that means it’s a good opportunity in the near term.”

That opportunity, however, is conditional. Edwards said his concern is that Bitcoin’s current cryptographic assumptions could become a live market issue before the network has completed the long process of developing, agreeing on and rolling out post-quantum upgrades.

“If we do nothing for two years, I probably won’t have any Bitcoin,” Edwards said. “There is a time limit to some of this stuff.”

Edwards criticized what he sees as complacency among parts of the Bitcoin development community. While he acknowledged that some preparatory work has been done, including references to BIP 360, he argued that Bitcoin still lacks a concrete migration path for post-quantum signatures and for coins that may remain exposed.

“Some of the biggest core developers recently said it’s not even our top 100 priorities,” Edwards said. “And I’m just like, how? For me this is the only priority that Bitcoin should have. Nothing else matters.”

He said the technical problem is solvable, but not trivial. Post-quantum signature schemes can be larger, raising questions about block space, throughput, wallet migration and the treatment of dormant coins. Edwards also highlighted the unresolved issue of lost coins, including older outputs that could become vulnerable if sufficiently powerful quantum computers arrive before a network-wide transition.

His base case is not that Bitcoin fails. Rather, he expects growing pressure from institutions, Ethereum’s quantum-readiness work and Bitcoin-focused companies to eventually force progress. He described any clear signal from major Bitcoin Core contributors that quantum resistance is becoming a serious priority as a potential catalyst.

“As soon as there’s any traction from implementing code to improve Bitcoin, I think we’ll reprice higher and this risk goes away,” Edwards said. “If we get traction on quantum, we could have a new all-time high very quickly, I think. If we don’t, we may not get one.”

Bitcoin Metrics Signal Value

Beyond quantum, Edwards said several Capriole metrics point to Bitcoin trading in a deep value zone. He cited Capriole’s energy value model, which he said placed Bitcoin’s fair value around $115,000, implying roughly a 43% discount at the time of the discussion. He also pointed to discounted readings across metrics such as dynamic range NVT, Yardstick, MVRV Z-score and miner-related indicators.

Still, Edwards stressed that mining metrics matter less than they once did. In his framework, institutional demand from ETFs and treasury companies has become the dominant supply-demand force. He said institutional buying had recently turned positive again, while long-term holder supply was beginning to rise after a long period of selling.

That combination, he argued, is consistent with seller exhaustion. It also helps explain why Bitcoin has held up despite weak sentiment.

For the near term, Edwards pointed to $71,000 as a key level and said Bitcoin could move toward $80,000 to $82,000 if current strength holds. A weekly or monthly close below $71,000, he said, would challenge that setup.