SBI Crypto Investment, a subsidiary of the Japanese financial giant SBI Holdings, has invested in crypto firm Breadwinner AG, Cointelegraph Japan reports on Jan. 15. SBI’s crypto investment fund did not disclose the amount contributed to Switzerland-based Breadwinner, the developer of mobile crypto wallet BRD. According to the announcement, BRD operates in 170 countries and has been downloaded by 1.8 million Android and iOS users. SBI’s Interim results announcement reveals that in the six months that ended Sept. 30, 2018, SBI Holdings registered over 176 million yen in revenue (about $1.6 million). BRD has not responded to Cointelegraph’s request for …

Disclaimer: this article has been amended to reflect the fact that the deadline for the FSA’s review is set at six months. According to new insight into the Japanese financial agency’s review process of companies applying for a cryptocurrency exchange license, seven applications will be either approved or rejected within six months. Cointelegraph Japan reported on this development on Jan. 12. The new information in regard to the review process offered by the Financial Services Agency (FSA) revealed that it involves a lengthy procedure that takes almost six months from the time of application — which includes the submission of …

Google (Alphabet Inc.) has reportedly blacklisted keywords mentioning Ethereum (ETH) on its advertising platform Google Ads, smart contract auditing startup Decenter tweeted on Jan. 10. The official Google Ads account replied to the tweet stating that cryptocurrency exchanges targeting the United States and Japan can be advertised on the platform, and that targeting other countries could be the reason for the ad rejection. When Decenter explained that they are a group of developers doing smart contract security audits and that they were seeing the error message when trying to use the “ethereum development services” and “ethereum security audits” keywords, Google …

Japan’s finance regulator, the Financial Services Agency (FSA), has granted full permission for cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck to continue operating in the country. Cointelegraph Japan reported on the development on Jan. 11, quoting an official communique. Coincheck, which was hacked in January 2018, losing altcoin tokens worth $530 million at the time, now joins the slowly increasing number of officially sanctioned exchanges serving the Japanese market. The step is a milestone for the exchange and for online broker Monex Group, which bought Coincheck for a nominal $33.5 million in April. According to a Jan. 11 press release from Monex Group, Coincheck …

Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) has denied that it is considering allowing Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs), Cointelegraph Japan reports Jan. 9. As Cointelegraph reported Monday, Bloomberg has recently published an article claiming that Japan’s FSA is considering the approval of a Bitcoin ETF, citing an anonymous source. Following the reports, Cointelegraph Japan has contacted the regulator, and the FSA’s representatives have denied Bloomberg’s claims, stating: “At this moment, we are not exploring an approval of ETFs based on crypto assets.” The agency’s staff also told Cointelegraph Japan that they do not know who the person familiar with the matter …

Japanese IT giant GMO Internet Group has published the latest monthly disclosure on its in-house crypto mining operations, confirming that it took a steep hit in overall mining revenue. GMO released the disclosure in a publicly available document on Jan. 8, also revealing a steady increase in its monthly Bitcoin (BTC) mining rewards. As previously reported, GMO’s consolidated losses for Q4 2018 totalled 35.5 billion yen ($320 million), with its unconsolidated loss tallying at around 38 billion yen ($334.5 million). As a result, the firm announced it would be shutting down its hardware manufacturing business, but would nonetheless continue its …

Japan's Financial Services Agency (FSA) is considering the regulation of unregistered firms that solicit investments in cryptocurrencies, Cointelegraph Japan reports on Jan. 8. The development is reportedly a bid to close a loophole in the country’s existing regulatory framework, in which unregistered firms that collect funds in crypto rather than fiat currencies remain in a gray zone. This situation exists because these firms do not explicitly come under the purview of Japan’s Financial Instruments and Exchange Act, which prohibits unregistered companies from collecting investment funds in cash, but fails to mention funds collected in cryptocurrency form. As CT Japan notes, …

Japan is known as a land of contrasts. A country where serenity and tranquillity can be found in the middle of the hustle and bustle of large global cities, where proud traditionalism stands side-by-side with the developers and innovators of breakthrough technologies, where kimonos are often found next to the latest fashion trends. This contradictory tendency is no different in Japan’s cryptocurrency ecosystem. It ranks as one of the top crypto-friendly nations on Earth, with favorable and forward-thinking cryptocurrency regulations. They made Bitcoin legal tender in 2017, and at one point, the Japanese yen dominated the buying and trading of …

Japan’s financial regulator is considering allowing Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETF), an anonymous source told Bloomberg on Jan. 7. Citing a person familiar with the matter, the publication reports that the Financial Services Agency (FSA) is testing interest in an ETF with a view to potentially giving the instrument the green light to trade on domestic markets. The move would place Japan in direct contrast to the United States, where regulators are risk-averse on ETFs but permit physical Bitcoin futures trading, something the FSA has rejected. This, Bloomberg notes, came due to the Japanese regulator “concluding that such products would …

Top Stories This Week Georgia State Senator Reports to Jail Over Alleged Theft of Crypto Mining Equipment Republican state senator of Georgia has reported to jail in the United States for allegedly lying about the theft of cryptocurrency mining equipment worth around $300,000. State senator Michael Williams had disclosed the theft in May, and is reporting to jail now over his false police reports and statement. Williams had declared that a server that was used to mine unnamed cryptocurrencies had disappeared from his office premises, but last month was indicted by grand jury on three counts. NYSE Operator’s Bakkt Announces …

Five more cryptocurrency exchanges have joined the Japan Virtual Currency Exchange Association (JVCEA), according to an official announcement on Jan. 4 from the JVCEA. The JVCEA is a self-regulatory body formed in April by 16 registered crypto exchanges that aims to create industry-wide investor safety standards. In October, Japan’s financial regulator formally granted self-regulatory status to the JVCEA to oversee the crypto sector. The body, made in part as a response to the January 2018 $534 million hack of crypto exchange Coincheck, had released a set of regulatory guidelines in June, including a ban on insider trading and prohibition against …

Ten years ago, on Jan. 3, 2009, the Bitcoin (BTC) network was created as Satoshi Nakamoto mined the genesis block, also known as block number zero. However, the identity behind the Bitcoin creator has remained one of the biggest mysteries in the crypto community since the original white paper was published by Satoshi in October 2008. Various journalistic investigations have attempted to unveil the person or group of individuals responsible for creating the top digital currency, but Satoshi’s real identity remains unknown to date. On his P2P Foundation profile — which went inactive in late 2010 — Nakamoto identifies as …