SBI Holdings, one of Japan’s largest financial conglomerates, is launching its first blockchain-based bond aimed at individual investors, a 10 billion yen (~$64.5 million) issuance that combines traditional fixed income features with blockchain settlement and crypto advantages.
Called SBI START Bonds, the securities are managed entirely on-chain using BOOSTRY’s “ibet for Fin” platform, a specialized enterprise blockchain platform for the issuance of security tokens.
These three-year bonds offer an indicative annual interest rate of 1.85% to 2.45%, payable semi-annually.
XRP Rewards
According to the SBI, investors in these bonds can also receive rewards in XRP tokens.
Resident retail investors and businesses who purchase more than 100,000 yen (around $650) and have an account at SBI VC Trade are eligible to receive XRP rewards in “an amount corresponding to their subscription amount.”
These bonuses, which the product page details as 200 yen in XRP for every 100,000 yen invested, will be distributed at issuance and again on each interest payment date until 2029.
The bonds are expected to begin secondary trading on March 25 through Osaka Digital Exchange’s proprietary “START” trading system.
SBI Holdings formed a partnership with Ripple in 2016 and has been supporting XRP ever since. A subsidiary of the company even distributed XRP directly to shareholders and supported XRP-powered remittances between Japan and the Philippines.
The company, according to its president and CEO, Yoshitaka Kitao, owns approximately 9% of Ripple Labs.
Kitao launched SBI Holdings in 1999 as a subsidiary of SoftBank (which was later spun off into an independent firm in 2006) and has since seen it grow into a financial giant, generating more than $8 billion in annual revenue. It began working with blockchain technology through its partnership with Ripple, which led to the creation of SBI Ripple Asia.
The company has since adopted stablecoins. It partnered with Circle to launch USDC in Japan and signed a memorandum of understanding with Ripple to distribute its RLUSD stablecoin.
