Cryptography Breakage as Systemic Risk

If mathematical or AI advances materially weaken widely used public‑key cryptography, the result would be a staged crisis: large institutions can fall back on offline and pre‑keyed channels, but small businesses and individuals face disproportionate friction and cost. 'Harvest now, decrypt later' behaviour (exfiltrate encrypted archives to decrypt later) would amplify risk long before a full‑blown attack, producing market moves (asset shifts, runs) and operational strains on payment networks. — This reframes cryptography not only as a technical problem but as an economic and governance vulnerability that could trigger reallocations of assets, emergency operational changes at banks, and new regulations for data‑handling and backups.