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All this is promising. But quantum financiers acknowledge that, for now, hardware is a limitation. "We're not yet able to perform these calculations at a scale where a quantum machine offers a real-world advantage over a classical one," says Mr Biercuk. One rough way to measure a quantum computer's capability is its number of "qubits", the analogue of classical computing's 1-or-0 bits. For many problems a quantum computer with thousands of stable qubits is provably far faster than any non-quantum machine that could ever be built—it just does not exist yet.
所有這些前景無限。但采用量子技術的金融家也承認，目前硬件是軟肋。“量子計算機目前的運算規模還是太小，不足以在真實世界里實現對經典計算機的優勢。”比埃庫克說。一種粗略衡量量子計算機性能的方法是看它的“量子比特”數量，量子比特類似于經典計算機中的1或0。對于許多計算問題來說，一臺擁有數千個穩定量子比特的量子計算機大概要比任何能造出來的非量子機器都要快得多——只是它尚未出現。
For now, the field must make do with small, unstable devices, which can perform calculations for only tiny fractions of a second before their delicate quantum states break down. John Preskill of the California Institute of Technology has dubbed these "NISQS"—"Noisy, Intermediate-Scale Quantum computers".
目前，量子計算只能將就使用不穩定的小型設備，它們的運算只能維持遠遠不到一秒的時間，之后其精細的量子態就會坍塌。加州理工學院的約翰·裴士基給這些設備取名為“NISQ”，即“帶噪音的中等規模量子計算機”。
Bankers are working on ways to conduct computations on such machines. Mr Zeng of Goldman pointed out that the computational resources needed to run quantum algorithms have fallen as programmers have tweaked their methods. Mr Pistoia points to papers his team has written exploring ways to scale useful financial calculations into even small machines.
銀行家們正想方設法在這類機器上完成運算。高盛的威廉·曾指出，隨著程序員不斷調整方法，運行量子算法所需的計算資源已經縮減。皮斯托亞稱其團隊撰寫了一些論文，探討縮小實用金融計算的規模、使之可以在小型機器上運行的方法。
And at some point those programmers will meet hardware-makers coming the other way. In 2019 Google was the first to demonstrate "quantum supremacy", using a 53-qubit NISQ machine to perform in minutes a calculation that would have taken the world's fastest supercomputer more than 10,000 years. IBM, which has invested heavily in quantum computing, reckons it can build a 1,000-qubit machine by 2023. Both it and Google have talked of a million qubits by the end of the decade.
某種程度上來說，這些程序員將和硬件制造商相遇。2019年，谷歌率先展示了其“量子霸權”，用53個量子比特的NISQ機器在幾分鐘內便完成了需要世界上最快的超級計算機花費一萬多年的時間才能完成的計算。在量子計算領域投入巨資的IBM公司估計自己到2023年可制造出有1000個量子比特的計算機。兩家公司都談到自己在十年內可以達到一百萬量子比特。
When might the financial revolution come? Mr Savoie thinks simple algorithms could be in use within 18 months, with credit-scoring a plausible early application. Mr Kondratyev says three to five years is more realistic. But the crucial point, says one observer, is that no one wants to be late to the party. One common worry is that whoever makes a breakthrough first may choose to reap the rewards in obscurity, rather than broadcast the fact to the world. After all, says Mr Biercuk, "that is how high-frequency trading got started".
這一金融革命究竟何時到來？薩瓦認為簡單的算法在18個月內便可投入使用，早期的應用很可能是信用評分。康德拉特耶夫則認為三到五年內實現可能更加現實。但一位觀察人士表示，關鍵是沒有人想在這場博弈中落后。大家都擔憂的一點是，無論最先取得突破的是誰，它都可能不會將之公之于眾，而是選擇悶聲發大財。比埃庫克說，“畢竟高頻交易就是這么來的”。
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