SBI Holdings has completed its acquisition of a majority stake in Singapore-based cryptocurrency platform Coinhako, after securing the green light from the Monetary Authority of Singapore. The deal closed July 16, making Coinhako a consolidated subsidiary of the Japanese financial giant. SBI now plans to weave Coinhako’s Southeast Asian customer base and operational chops into its own global digital asset ambitions — starting with a corridor linking Japan and the region.
How the deal happened
Through its subsidiary SBI Ventures Asset Pte. Ltd., SBI injected capital into Coinhako’s parent company Holdbuild Pte. Ltd. and bought shares from existing shareholders. The exact financial terms weren’t disclosed. Coinhako operates via Hako Technology Pte. Ltd., which holds a Major Payment Institution license from MAS, and Alpha Hako Ltd., registered in the British Virgin Islands. The platform has spent a decade building a customer base across Southeast Asia.
SBI’s bigger play
Chairman Yoshitaka Kitao said the group aims to “create a global corridor for digital assets by connecting exchanges around the world.” He called Singapore a crucial region because its digital asset regulations are ahead of the curve. SBI plans to combine Coinhako’s regional network with its own financial services, technology, and global footprint. On the product side, the company intends to develop services tied to its yen-denominated stablecoin JPYSC, and flagged opportunities in tokenization, on-chain finance, and cross-border trading.
Coinhako co-founder and CEO Yusho Liu called the deal a natural step, pointing to the platform’s decade-long track record of compliance.
A busy month for SBI
This isn’t SBI’s only recent crypto move. In the past month, it led EDX Markets’ $76 million Series C, backed risk manager Gauntlet, launched JPYSC, and partnered with the Solana Foundation on an on-chain financial market in Japan. In June 2024, SBI agreed to buy Tokyo exchange Bitbank for about $289 million. And this week, it teamed with Ondo Finance to tokenize Japanese equities.
The group holds more than 14 million users and $308 billion in assets under custody.
JPYSC still on a leash
One catch: JPYSC doesn’t yet support withdrawals to external wallets. For now, the stablecoin is confined to SBI’s own platform. That limits its immediate utility for cross-border flows, but SBI’s roadmap suggests that will change as the digital asset corridor takes shape.
