FX Branch of Japanese Giant SBI Planning Crypto Move – Report

Another subsidiary of the Japanese financial giant the SBI Group, FX Clearing Trust, is reportedly targetting crypto-related business expansion.

Per an official release, the firm has now acquired a license for investment trust-related business operations, and will rename itself the SBI Clearing Trust.

The firm was set up in 2014, and has capital reserves of over USD 1.8m. Although the official release made no direct mention of crypto-related developments, Nikkei, reported that the SBI arm was also planning to expand into cryptoasset investment-related operations in the near future.

The company stated that in recent times, the need for trusts in finance had “become more sophisticated and widespread,” adding that in order to “respond to the diversification” of the investment market it was “not limiting” itself to the FX market.

SBI operates a number of crypto-related subsidiaries, including its own domestic crypto exchange, SBI VC Trade, and the mining firm SBI Crypto.

The most recent move comes in a busy month for SBI and its quickly expanding crypto and blockchain operations. Last week, the firm announced that it would be using its blockchain and distributed ledger technology prowess to digitize local gift certificates issued by the Chamber of Commerce in Miyama, Fukuoka Prefecture.

The Miyama is SBI’s sixth such blockchain tie-in with digital gift certificate initiatives organized by city governments as an attempt to revitalize their local economies – allowing users to spend their certificates using smartphone apps.

However, the developments have been somewhat overshadowed by events elsewhere in Asia, with SBI supremo Yoshitaka Kitao telling the Financial Times this week that SBI was set to pull out of Hong Kong due to recently imposed restrictions on business “freedom.”

He also claimed that other Japanese firms were likely to follow suit, but stated that the firms in question did not have the courage to admit it yet. Kitao said,

“They are unlike me. I’m a very straightforward guy. But all the others, in their bellies, they think they should move out or won’t invest more in Hong Kong.”

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