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Japan’s SBI is set to acquire a 12% stake in Clear Markets as part of its initiative to expand its cryptocurrency business portfolio.
According to a financial results report published by the Japanese financial services giant, SBI Holdings is planning to acquire a stake of up to 20% in future.
Clear Markets, an electronic trading platform development and operations business based in the US, offers OTC derivatives trading services in Japan, the UK and the US.
The move by SBI to acquire a stake in Clear Markets is aimed at creating a crypto derivatives trading platform specifically for institutional investors.
With the platform in place, financial institutions will be able to better participate in the crypto derivatives marketplace.
Clear Markets will offer hedging services for crypto swap transactions, a necessity in as far as handling digital currencies and the financial instruments that make use of them.
Higher Liquidity
SBI highlighted in the report that that increasing adoption of digital currencies and their derivatives will contribute to an increment in liquidity levels.
Though the price of the stake was not revealed in the report, Nikkei Asian Review places it in the environs of $9 million.
Since SBI Group’s crypto business is to a great extent retail oriented, so the addition of the new market is set to provide “the missing piece” according to Mamoru Fujimoto, the SBI head of investments in blockchain and artificial intelligence.