SBI Takes Over TaoTao Exchange That Just Ditched Binance

Tim Alper
Last updated: | 2 min read

One of Japan’s biggest financial companies, the SBI Group, has made a major move in the domestic market, snapping up a controlling stake in the TaoTao crypto exchange from Yahoo Japan.

SBI’s chief executive Yoshitaka Kitao. Source: ripple.com

The size of the deal was not disclosed, but TaoTao (previously known as BitARG prior to Yahoo Japan’s involvement) confirmed in a press release that SBI had acquired all of Yahoo Japan operator Z Holdings’ shares in the exchange – while Japanese media reports are claiming that TaoTao has become an official SBI “subsidiary.”

In the press release, TaoTao explained that it had undergone a “change of shareholders,” with Yahoo Japan’s shares.

The company added that it had also “formed a partnership with” SBI’s SBILM subsidiary, a newly launched branch of the financial giant that is set to use R3 blockchain consortium-developed technology to power its foreign exchange trading solutions.

The news comes in a busy week for both TaoTao and SBI. Earlier this week, the former stated that it had ended talks with Binance on a ”strategic partnership discussion” with TaoTao and Z Holdings – a deal that could have seen Binance return to the Japanese market.

SBI operates a crypto exchange of its own in Japan – SBI VC Trade – as well as a crypto mining subsidiary named SBI Crypto. It also runs the SBI-Ripple Asia blockchain network in conjunction with American crypto giant Ripple.

Yahoo Japan is the nation’s leading search engine. The firm is backed by SoftBank, which owns a 48% stake in the company Yahoo Japan. The company is also set to merge with Line, the brainchild of South Korean internet giant Naver, in a deal that will conclude early next year.

It has also been a momentous week for SBI. Today, Cryptonews.com reported that SBI is set to join forces with a Swiss cryptobank to create a USD 66.3m unlisted stocks fund for promising crypto and blockchain startups in Europe and Southeast Asia.

Also, this past summer, the Japanese financial giant stumped up USD 30 million for a stake in a UK-based crypto liquidity firm.

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