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Welcome to the one hundred thirtieth edition of the Japan FinTech Observer.
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Last week, the World Athletic Championships took place in Tokyo, putting the Olympic Stadium finally to the grand use it was designed for (including an audience!).
Whether inspired by the athletic performances or not, the Bank of Japan stretched themselves into launching the divestment phase for the approximately 7% of equity market capitalization they have accumulated in the form of ETFs — mostly under Kuroda’s leadership — albeit at a rate that would take more than 100 years to divest.
Lastly, the field is set for the LDP President’s election on October 4. Takaichi and young Koizumi are leading the polls. If you are into horse trading, now is the time.
Here is what we are going to cover this week:
Venture Capital & Private Markets: Antler has announced the appointment of Hiro Kiga as Partner of Southeast Asia and Japan; SoftBank Group will lay off nearly 20% of its Vision Fund team globallyInsurance: KKR has completed the acquisition of Hoken Minaoshi Hompo Group (HMH), a major domestic insurance distributorBanking: SMBC Group has completed its acquisition of a 20% equity stake in India’s YES BANK; it will acquire another 4.2% from a company affiliated with The Carlyle Group; separately, SMBC sold its entire 1.65% equity stake in Kotak Mahindra Bank; Caulis to establish “Grid Data KYC” in partnership with 10 nationwide power companies; SBI Sumishin Net Bank will migrate its core banking system provided by IBM Japan to an Amazon Web Services cloud environment by early 2028Payments: PayPay will be accepted at more than 2 million merchants across South Korea; Indonesia’s GoPay users can now make payments at QRIS-enabled merchants in Japan; Norinchukin Bank, Progmat, and Datachain have successfully completed the first phase of verification for cross-border payments with Korea; Densan System has concluded a basic agreement with JPYC Corporation, and joined Japan Smart Chain as a Vision Partner; the Kaia DLT Foundation and LINE NEXT have announced “Project Unify”, a Web3 super app based on stablecoins; Uniqlo announced that it would be shutting down “UNIQLO Pay”Capital Markets: Infcurion to IPO on the TSE Growth Market in October; SMBC Group and Jefferies launch Wholesale Japanese Equities Joint Venture; the TWSE and the TSE debuted their first cross-border exchange-traded fundsAsset Management: AlpacaTech & Vertex plan joint development of innovative Asset Management solutionsDigital Assets: SBINFT and Japan Blockchain Infrastructure have completed development to integrate Japan’s domestic public blockchain “Japan Open Chain” with the NFT marketplace “SBINFT Market”The Last Word: The 100 Year ETF Divestment Plan
AloJapan.com