💴 A single Japanese financial group just earned roughly $570 million from crypto in one fiscal year. SBI Holdings — best known for running Japan's largest online brokerage — disclosed on May 1, 2026, that its crypto-asset segment hit a record 89.6 billion yen in revenue, capping a year in which group net profit jumped 2.6× to a four-year high. Behind the headline number sits a coordinated push: a yen-backed stablecoin called JPYSC, a first-of-its-kind license to lend yen against crypto collateral, an acquisition bid for rival exchange bitbank, and a fresh Visa card that pays rewards in BTC, ETH or XRP. Why is Japan betting on a yen stablecoin while the US, Hong Kong and the EU all build different fences around the same idea? And can a non-dollar token ever escape the gravitational pull of USDT and USDC?

Four announcements dropped in a single morning

At 10:10 a.m. on May 1, SBI Holdings (Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime, ticker 8473) released its consolidated results for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2026. Net profit attributable to owners came in at 427.5 billion yen ($2.72 billion), up 2.6× year-on-year — a four-year high powered largely by the sale of stake in SBI Sumishin Net Bank.

But the financial press fixated on a different line: the crypto-asset segment posted record revenue of 89.6 billion yen (about $570 million), beating analyst estimates and underscoring how mainstream Japan's onshore exchange business has become.

The bigger story, though, was what SBI announced alongside the results. In a single morning, the group disclosed:

  1. Talks to acquire bitbank — a top-tier domestic exchange — through a capital and business alliance.
  2. Launch of the SBI VISA Crypto Card — a co-branded card with Visa and consumer-finance arm APLUS that converts spending points into Bitcoin, Ethereum or XRP at no exchange fee.
  3. Japan's first USDC lending service, operated through SBI VC Trade.
  4. Concrete progress on JPYSC, the yen-pegged stablecoin being co-developed with Startale Group, with a target launch in the first quarter of fiscal 2026 (April–June 2026).

Read together, they sketch out an ambitious goal: rebuild Japanese consumer and corporate finance on top of public blockchains, with SBI as the rails operator.

What is actually generating the record profit?

SBI VC Trade, the group's crypto exchange, absorbed Bitpoint Japan earlier this year and now serves around 1.92 million accounts holding deposits of roughly 610 billion yen ($3.88 billion). If the bitbank deal closes, the combined entity would hold close to 1.2 trillion yen ($7.6 billion) — enough to sit comfortably at the top of Japan's exchange league table. For context, the entire domestic crypto-exchange industry currently holds around 5 trillion yen ($31.8 billion) in customer deposits across roughly 14 million accounts.

But retail brokerage is only one engine. SBI's institutional crypto business now supports 22 listed companies that hold BTC and other tokens as treasury assets — a category Japanese investors call "crypto treasury," led by names like Metaplanet. SBI claims about 70% market share by registration count for a peculiarly Japanese service: helping companies qualify for an exemption from year-end mark-to-market taxation on unsold crypto. Without this exemption, Japanese corporations face tax bills on paper gains they have not realized — a quirk that has historically pushed companies offshore.

Then there is the "next-generation business segment," a catch-all for the group's Web3 ventures. It posted 56.2 billion yen in revenue, 22 billion yen in pre-tax profit, and turned profitable for the first time. A meaningful chunk came from valuation gains on tokens received as validator rewards — meaning a major Japanese financial group is now formally booking income from operating blockchain infrastructure.

JPYSC: Japan's first "Type-3 electronic payment instrument"

The most consequential announcement was JPYSC.

The token is being built jointly by Startale Group (which leads the technical work), SBI Shinsei Trust Bank (the issuer), and SBI VC Trade (the primary distributor). Targeted launch: by June 2026.

To understand why JPYSC is novel, you need to know how Japan classifies stablecoins. Under the amended Payment Services Act, stablecoins are legally defined as "electronic payment instruments" and split into four types based on issuer: Type 1 (banks), Type 2 (money-transfer operators), Type 3 (trust banks), and Type 4 (foreign issuers). Each type comes with different rules.

JPYSC is set to be Japan's first Type-3 stablecoin — and that distinction matters. Type-2 issuers (like the existing JPYC operator) face a hard cap: a single user cannot send or hold more than 1 million yen (about $6,400) in stablecoin at a time. That ceiling makes Type-2 tokens essentially unusable for B2B settlement, treasury operations, or any meaningful DeFi activity. Trust-issued (Type-3) stablecoins do not carry the cap, opening the door to corporate payments and on-chain capital markets.

In parallel, SBI and Startale are building Strium Network, a Layer-1 blockchain optimized for tokenized financial assets — equities, RWAs, and stablecoins — running 24/7 with provisions for autonomous trading by AI agents. SBI executives have publicly framed this as a transition from "human-decided finance" to "AI-agent-delegated finance," a phrasing that may sound futuristic but reflects how seriously the group is taking on-chain settlement infrastructure.

Crypto-collateral lending — a Japanese first

Equally notable was SBI VC Trade's plan to obtain a money-lending license so it can extend yen loans collateralized by Bitcoin and other crypto assets. SBI Shinsei Bank Group will provide operational support.

This is a first for Japan. While crypto-collateral lending is well established overseas through firms like Nexo and Ledn, no Japanese licensed exchange has previously held the consumer-lending license needed to lend yen against crypto. The mechanism solves a real problem: under current Japanese tax rules, selling crypto triggers income tax of up to 55% on gains (treated as miscellaneous income). A 2026 tax reform will move crypto to a flat 20% capital-gains tax, but until that lands, holders with large unrealized gains face an uncomfortable choice between holding forever or paying punitive tax. Borrowing against the position is a clean third option.

US, EU, Hong Kong, Singapore — where Japan fits

To understand what makes the Japanese approach unusual, it helps to put it next to the regulatory regimes that emerged elsewhere over the past 18 months.

United States: President Trump signed the GENIUS Act (Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act) into law on July 18, 2025 — the first major federal crypto legislation to be enacted. It limits stablecoin issuance to subsidiaries of insured depository institutions, federally licensed nonbanks supervised by the OCC, and state-chartered issuers (capped at $10 billion in issuance). Reserves must be 1:1 in dollars or short-term Treasuries, with monthly public disclosures. Crucially, the law's design ties stablecoins to demand for US Treasuries, which the White House openly describes as a strategy to entrench the dollar's reserve-currency status. The companion Clarity Act, dealing with the broader market structure, passed the House in mid-2025 and is still working through the Senate as of May 2026.

EU: The Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) entered full effect at the end of 2024. It is widely considered the most comprehensive crypto framework in the world. Yet euro-denominated stablecoins have failed to gain meaningful traction — virtually all of the top stablecoins by market cap remain dollar-pegged, and CoinGecko data shows no euro-denominated token in the top ranks. The lesson: regulation alone cannot win a currency competition.

Hong Kong: The Stablecoins Ordinance took effect on August 1, 2025. On April 10, 2026, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority issued the first two licenses — to HSBC and Anchorpoint Financial (a Standard Chartered-led joint venture including Animoca Brands and HKT). Just 2 of 36 applicants made the cut, a 5.6% acceptance rate. Hong Kong's regime is notably strict: identity-verified wallets only, AML rules embedded in smart contracts, no interest payments to holders, and a full ban on algorithmic stablecoins. The strategy is to position bank-issued HKD stablecoins for regional trade settlement rather than retail use.

Singapore: The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) released its Stablecoin Regulatory Framework in 2023, allowing both bank and non-bank issuers under proportionate rules. Singapore is widely regarded as the early architect of stablecoin policy in Asia.

Against this backdrop, Japan's distinguishing feature is the three-track issuer structure — banks, money-transfer operators, and trust banks each get their own regulatory lane, with different limits and capabilities. This is more permissive than Hong Kong's bank-only path and more conservative than Singapore's flexible regime.

Why bother with a yen stablecoin? Three structural problems

The natural overseas reaction is: why does Japan need a yen stablecoin at all? Three forces are at work.

Currency sovereignty: The global stablecoin market now exceeds $315 billion, with over 90% denominated in dollars. Tether's USDT alone hit roughly $183 billion in circulation in Q1 2026, and Tether's Treasury holdings now rank 17th globally — larger than many sovereign nations. Stablecoins are becoming the new container for dollar hegemony, and if yen-based settlement disappears from on-chain rails, even Japanese companies trading with each other could end up routing through dollars.

Network effects, working against Japan: The MiCA experience is a warning. The EU built world-class regulation, and euro stablecoins still failed to dent USDC and USDT. Global exchanges, DeFi protocols, and merchants standardize on dollars. Whether JPYSC can break that gravity is genuinely uncertain.

The "no need" problem: Stablecoins took off in emerging markets as a hedge against hyperinflation. Japan does not have that pull factor — the yen is stable, PayPay and Suica handle daily payments, and bank transfers are cheap and instant. JPYSC's path to retail usage is far less obvious than its institutional one.

A "Coinbase of Japan" comes into focus

The bitbank acquisition is the move that ties everything together. Combined, SBI VC Trade and bitbank would hold around 2.9 million accounts and 1.2 trillion yen — overtaking Coincheck and bitFlyer to become Japan's largest crypto platform. That scale matters not just for fees but for what is coming next: spot Bitcoin ETFs (the Japan Exchange Group's CEO publicly endorsed listing them on April 30), the move to flat 20% crypto taxation, and the launch of trust-type stablecoins that need a deep distribution channel.

In other words, SBI is positioning itself as the single counter for everything an ordinary Japanese saver might want to do on-chain — a deliberate parallel to how Coinbase became the default on-ramp for the US ETF era.

What about in your country?

SBI's playbook is the most ambitious answer any Japanese financial group has put forward to the question of how to survive the stablecoin era. The US is racing for dollar dominance. Hong Kong is gating issuance to large banks for trade settlement. The EU built strong rules but hasn't won the currency. Japan is taking its own road: a three-tier issuer structure, a trust-type token without payment caps, and a Layer-1 chain built for AI-agent finance.

But the future of stablecoins will probably be decided more by user experience than by regulatory design. So we want to know: how present are stablecoins where you live? Can you actually pay with USDT or USDC at a real merchant? Is there interest in a stablecoin pegged to your own national currency? Tell us in the comments.

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