SBI Holdings Finalizes Bitbank Acquisition

The final stage of the takeover involved Bitbank repurchasing shares previously held by MIXI and Ceres. With these transactions closed, SBI Holdings now serves as the exchange's sole parent company. Despite the shift in ownership, Bitbank management confirmed that existing exchange services and client arrangements will remain unchanged. To foster integration, leadership from the SBI Group has joined the board; Tomohiko Kondo, president of SBI VC Trade, has been appointed as a director at Bitbank, while Bitbank CEO Noriyuki Hirosue will serve as an outside director at SBI VC Trade. Three previous outside directors—Satoshi Takagi, Nobuhiro Kanayama, and Masaya Kubota—have stepped down.

This acquisition aligns with SBI’s broader strategy to dominate the Japanese digital asset market. The group is leveraging its financial resources to scale across multiple fronts, including the distribution of stablecoins and institutional trading infrastructure. By bringing Bitbank under its umbrella, SBI consolidates its position alongside its other crypto operation, SBI VC Trade, which recently absorbed Bitpoint Japan. Bitbank intends to utilize the parent group’s extensive customer network and financial tools to accelerate its own service development.