Japan’s Crypto Bailout Fund 💸

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So, Japan’s Financial Services Agency – the FSA, which sounds like a supervillain organization, honestly – has decided that cryptocurrency exchanges need a “rainy day fund.” Like, the kind you keep for emergencies, except the emergency is usually “someone hacked the Bitcoin” and not, you know, a leaky roof. 🙄 Apparently, just telling these exchanges to keep the digital money in “cold wallets” wasn’t working. Shocking.

  • Basically, they’re making crypto exchanges save up for when they inevitably get robbed.
  • They’ll submit a bill sometime around 2026, because urgency isn’t really their thing.

There have been… incidents. Not just little hiccups, but full-blown digital heists. Like that time DMM Bitcoin got whacked for over 4,500 Bitcoins. They had to beg, borrow, and sell off company assets to try and make people whole. It was, I assume, deeply unpleasant for everyone involved, except maybe the hackers. They’re probably on a beach somewhere, sipping tiny umbrellas in their Bitcoins.🍹

The FSA wants to be like the responsible adult in the room – which, let’s be real, is a low bar given the state of things. They’re looking at how they regulate regular stockbrokers, who have to set aside money for when they mess up. Because humans mess up. And apparently, computers do too, even when they are “secure.” It’s fantastic.

Currently, the exchanges are just supposed to keep the money locked up, like a child’s piggy bank. Which, as we’ve established, hasn’t deterred the digital bandits. Now they’ll have to actually save money. Imagine.

How much, you ask? Well, that depends on how much chaos they’ve caused in the past. And how much they’re likely to cause. And maybe what kind of mood the FSA is in that day. 🤷‍♀️ Between 2 billion and 40 billion yen. Which is…a lot. They can also buy insurance, because of course. It’s always about the insurance, isn’t it?

And here’s a detail I appreciate: if the exchange goes belly up, someone will be allowed to come in and hand the money back to the customers. Provided, of course, there is any money left. A lawyer, or a court-appointed designated money-deliverer. It sounds delightfully bureaucratic.

Binance, bless their profit-driven hearts, already has an “emergency fund.” Funded by trading fees, naturally. Because why wouldn’t they profit from your anxiety? Same deal in India with CoinDCX. It’s just a grand old time, isn’t it? A system built on trust, meticulously managed by people who are, let’s say, incentivized.

FSA is recalibrating Japan’s crypto approach

The FSA, in a rare attempt at nuance, is trying to be both the fun police and the cheerleader. They want to protect investors, yes, but they also want to let people play with their crypto money. They’re thinking of moving crypto under the same rules as stocks. Which means tax breaks and ETFs and… well, more things to worry about. It’s progress, I guess. Progress wrapped in a layer of anxiety. 🙃

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2025-11-25 08:54