The Japan Encrypted Currency Exchange, Binance Japan, announced capital and business cooperation with the local cashless giant PayPay (under the flag of the SoftBank Group), which will buy 40 per cent of Binance Japan’s shares.
According to the Binance official blog announcement, the 40 per cent equity acquisition of PayPay was completed in September 2025, making Binance Japan its interest law consortium. This total capital injection is not publicly available, but the market estimates about 5 billion yen, aimed at accelerating Binance ‘ s compliance and product innovation in Japan. At the operational level, the first wave of cooperation between the two sides focused on the integration of encrypted payments. Users can directly use PayPay balances (two-dimensional code payment or binding cards) in Binance Japan App to purchase mainstream encrypted assets such as BTC, ETH, without additional transfers, and the transaction rate is reduced to 0.1 per cent. After the sale of the encryption, the funds are immediately available in PayPay accounts to support daily consumption, such as shopping at convenience stores or online payments, bridging digital assets to the real economy. The “encrypted points” system is planned, which allows the user-trading encryption to receive PayPay points, and vice versa, to enter the market at a low threshold.
“PayPay’s huge user base will breathe life into us, and this collaboration will make the encryption transaction as simple as swipe-coding payments.” PayPay Group spokesperson added: “We will explore together the new boundaries of digital finance to make Web3 more accessible to ordinary users.” These functions are expected to go online in November, initially covering iOS and Android App, and are compatible with the regulatory requirements of the Japan Financial Services Office (FSA). Since entering the Japanese market in 2018, Binance has faced a rigorous encryption licence review and was officially licensed by the FSA in 2023, but only 15 per cent of the local exchange is used. The alliance with PayPay is a continuation of the Binance Local Priority strategy: PayPay, as the lead in cash payments to Japan, had over Yen 20 trillion in transactions in 2024, with a user penetration rate of 55 per cent, and its SoftBank background provided more financial and technical support.
This alliance will reshape Japan’s digital finance landscape: for users, the experience of “one App fixes” reduces friction, with an estimated 30 per cent increase in the volume of encrypted transactions; and for merchants, PayPay’s business network (over 4 million) will provide seamless access to encrypted settlements and drive DeFi to land. CoinDesk analyses that the move “will erode the share of traditional bank remittances and promote the popularization of Web3”.
