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first_img Southeast Asia's crypto financing rebounds to 680 million USD, with investors focusing on mature companies

The latest report from the market intelligence platform Tracxn shows that since 2026, the Southeast Asian blockchain industry has accumulated $680 million in equity financing, more than double the $319 million for the entire year of 2025. However, this round of recovery is mainly driven by a few mature companies: only 25 rounds of financing were completed this year, compared to 46 rounds in 2025 and a peak of 206 rounds in 2022; the $400 million Series D financing of the cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com accounted for nearly 60% of the total.From a segmented perspective, crypto financial services are the biggest beneficiaries, receiving a total of $498 million in financing this year (19 rounds), a year-on-year increase of 48.4%; tokenization platforms received $114 million, and decentralized application development platforms received $77 million. Among the 3,957 blockchain companies tracked by Tracxn, 1,323 have received equity financing, but only 167 have entered Series A and beyond, 50 have entered Series B, 14 have entered Series C, and only 4 have entered Series D and beyond.In terms of geography, Singapore dominates the Southeast Asian crypto investment market, accounting for 82.5% of the region's cumulative blockchain financing amount of $6.2 billion, and has 2,285 tracked companies, while Jakarta, ranked second, accounts for only 3%. In terms of exits, there have been 43 acquisitions and 4 IPOs in the region, including SBI Group's acquisition of the Singapore exchange CoinHako and Bybit's acquisition of NOBI. Southeast Asia has produced 6 blockchain unicorns to date, including Sygnum, Bitkub, Sky Mavis, and Amber Group.

first_img The U.S. FinCEN links $12.7 billion in suspicious activities to Southeast Asian cryptocurrency investment scams

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) of the U.S. Department of the Treasury released an analysis and alert on Thursday, linking approximately $12.7 billion in suspicious financial activities to cryptocurrency investment scams operated by Southeast Asian parks. About 1,300 institutions submitted 33,904 suspicious activity reports covering the period from September 2023 to December 2025. Cryptocurrency-focused money service businesses submitted 55% of the reports, involving $5.5 billion; banks submitted 41%, involving $6.4 billion; and securities firms accounted for the remaining $784.5 million.The number of reports has been growing at an average monthly rate of 10.9%, with the amount involved increasing by 18%. Scammers used at least 22 types of digital assets, with Ethereum, USDT, and USDC being the most common. On-chain analysis shows that regardless of the asset victims initially purchased, the funds are almost always converted into stablecoins, with nearly all converted to USDT, and then transferred through DeFi protocols or exchanges outside the U.S. Scammers also reused collection addresses across multiple victims, which is one way some institutions identified this pattern.The report indicates that about 25% involved elderly individuals, which is comparable to the 24.4% of the population that is over 60 years old, leading FinCEN to conclude that the elderly are not disproportionately targeted. The FBI estimates that in 2024, the U.S. population over 60 lost $4.8 billion to scams. These parks are primarily located in Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar, and U.S. authorities have seized over $25 million related to the associated scams this year.

first_img Bitget is in talks with Wall Street giants like BlackRock for distribution cooperation in Asia

According to CoinDesk, Bitget CEO Gracy Chen told CoinDesk that Bitget is in talks with several large global financial institutions, including BlackRock, to help expand the distribution of digital asset products in Asia. Gracy Chen cited BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, as an example, stating that it hopes to expand the distribution of tokenized ETFs in Asia and mentioned, "We maintain very close communication with BlackRock regarding distribution in the Asian market."A spokesperson for BlackRock responded that the company's cryptocurrency exchange-traded products (ETPs) have been launched in Asia and confirmed that it regularly collaborates with virtual asset service providers on different projects, but did not comment on specific expansion plans in the Asian market. According to an OECD report, as of June 2025, the trading volume of blockchain cryptocurrency assets in Asia is expected to grow by 69% year-on-year, the highest growth rate among all global regions.BlackRock manages assets totaling $11.6 trillion. At the 2026 Hong Kong Consensus conference, Nicholas Peach, head of BlackRock's Asia-Pacific iShares division, stated that Asian household wealth is approximately $108 trillion, and even if only 1% is allocated to cryptocurrency assets, it could lead to nearly $2 trillion in inflows. Bitget has 125 million registered users globally, with about half located in East Asia and Southeast Asia. Company data from Q1 2026 shows that 52% of users hold both cryptocurrencies and traditional stocks.

first_img Ripple and Coincheck have successively launched digital asset custody cooperation in Asia

According to Cointelegraph, Ripple announced a partnership with digital asset infrastructure company SettleMint to provide tokenized asset custody and management solutions for financial institutions. Ripple's institutional-grade digital asset custody infrastructure, Ripple Custody, will integrate with SettleMint's Digital Asset Lifecycle Platform (DALP), covering the entire lifecycle of tokens and simplifying the custody process for institutions.Just the day before, digital asset service provider Coincheck Group announced a partnership with wallet infrastructure company DFNS to build digital asset wallet technology and custody services in Japan. DFNS's wallet-as-a-service can provide institutions with complete transaction lifecycle management, including workflow orchestration and governance controls, and supports over 100 blockchain networks. Both collaborations aim to build more institutional-grade digital asset infrastructure to address the barriers for traditional financial institutions entering the crypto space.The 2025 Global Crypto Adoption Index released by Chainalysis shows that on-chain crypto activity in the Asia-Pacific region has the fastest growth rate in the world, with a year-on-year increase of 69%. Currently, several Asian countries are formulating their own cryptocurrency regulatory frameworks. The bill passed in Japan in July classifies crypto assets as financial assets under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act. Japan's Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki previously expressed a desire to bring crypto assets under the same regulatory framework as traditional financial assets.

first_img SBI Holdings invests $270 million in Indonesian platform Ajaib to acquire a 20% stake

SBI Holdings, a Japanese financial services group, announced an investment of $270 million in the Indonesian multi-asset investment platform Ajaib Group, acquiring approximately 20% minority equity, making the Jakarta-based Ajaib an equity method associate of SBI. Ajaib confirmed this strategic investment in a LinkedIn post on Friday, stating that it is the largest tech financing in Indonesia since 2022, bringing its total funding since 2019 to over $500 million.Ajaib offers investment channels including domestic and international stocks, bonds, mutual funds, exchange-traded funds, crypto assets, stablecoins, commodities, and foreign exchange, while also covering payment and savings services, and providing over-the-counter stablecoin settlement services and liquidity support for Indonesian businesses and institutional investors. SBI stated that this collaboration will promote the adoption of digital assets in Asia and continue to expand its business footprint in the region.The SBI Group operates the Japanese crypto exchange SBI VC Trade, the Singapore exchange Coinhako, and the UK market maker B2C2. Other digital asset projects include the yen stablecoin JPYSC and the Layer 1 blockchain Strium developed for financial applications. SBI Holdings Chairman and President Yoshitaka Kitao stated that in the era of tokenization, the importance of global infrastructure for digital assets is increasingly prominent. SBI is establishing a network of digital asset exchanges in Southeast Asia through the "SBI APAC Digital Economic Zone" initiative, and Ajaib's model of combining traditional financial products with digital assets aligns with this strategy.

first_img SBI acquired a 20% stake in Indonesian brokerage Ajaib for $270 million, expanding its yen stablecoin

According to CoinDesk, Japanese financial giant SBI Holdings plans to acquire a 20% stake in Indonesian online brokerage Ajaib Group for $270 million by the end of this month to expand the circulation of its yen stablecoin JPYSC in Southeast Asia and utilize blockchain technology to build cross-border settlement infrastructure.Ajaib provides a foothold for SBI to enter the Indonesian market. Indonesia is one of the largest retail investment markets in ASEAN, with over 20 million retail investors and an estimated retail market size of $375 billion. Ajaib operates online brokerage, forex margin trading, cryptocurrency, and asset management businesses in Indonesia, and this $270 million deal is also the largest tech financing in Indonesia in years.SBI Chairman and President Yoshitaka Kitao stated that in the era of tokenization, the importance of global digital asset infrastructure is becoming increasingly prominent. This investment is part of SBI's strategy in Southeast Asia, having previously acquired Singapore cryptocurrency exchange Coinhako for about $100 million and invested in Singapore digital securities trading platform DigiFT. The Japanese government has also recently announced plans to build blockchain infrastructure for stocks and government bonds, with the expectation of launching 24/7 on-chain settlement in the early 2030s.

first_img Pakistan established a cryptocurrency regulatory framework with only 8% of the budget, revealed the minister at Bitcoin Asia

Bilal Bin Saqib, the Minister of State for Pakistan and Chairman of the Pakistan Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA), revealed at the Bitcoin Asia conference that the country completed the establishment of its virtual asset regulatory system in less than six months, using only about 8% of the approved budget, which is approximately $200,000, with about 92% of the budget remaining unused. Saqib stated that the government should not measure success by how much money is spent, but rather by the actual delivery of results. The regulatory framework covers activities such as exchanges, custody, brokerage, asset management, lending, and settlement, and introduces requirements regarding governance, anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing, customer asset protection, cybersecurity, and market conduct. Saqib emphasized that Pakistan's regulatory ambitions extend beyond the current digital asset market, with future focus on the tokenization market, programmable payments, stablecoins, machine-to-machine transactions, and the AI agent economy, noting the need to establish corresponding regulatory rules for agent payments and the agent economy. Saqib stated that emerging markets do not need to spend a decade catching up; they can build on the frontier. With a population of over 240 million, Pakistan is a potentially significant market for emerging financial technologies. The rapid transition from legislation to licensing in the country is being used as a demonstration case for the government's response to next-generation financial infrastructure.
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