Gumi and SBI Financial Services launch $18.3M crypto investment fund for Japanese institutions, focusing on Bitcoin and altcoins via staking and hedging.
VC & Fundraising ·
Gumi, through subsidiary gC Labs, and SBI Financial Services are launching a cryptocurrency investment fund on August 1 valued at approximately 3 billion yen ($18.3 million). SBI Crypto Fund I will operate as a three-year private placement vehicle with participation from several institutional investors, including Daiwa Securities Group.
The fund's strategy centers on exposure to Bitcoin and major altcoins through a mix of staking, rebalancing, and hedging approaches. The initiative positions itself as a connection point between Japanese enterprises and the cryptocurrency asset market, with organizers citing accumulation of track record as foundational for potential future cryptocurrency exchange-traded products—a product class that Japan has not yet approved.
The move signals institutional appetite for crypto exposure within Japan's traditional finance sector, though the fund's scale remains modest relative to global institutional flows. It remains unclear whether other similar vehicles will follow or whether regulatory pathways for crypto ETFs in Japan will accelerate based on this fund's performance.