Rakuten’s Crypto Exchange Is Now Live

Japan’s Retail Giant Is Launching Its Rakuten Wallet Exchange, A Year After Acquiring Everybody’s Bitcoin

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One of the largest companies in Japan, Rakuten, announced that their spot trading exchange, dubbed as Rakuten Wallet, is now live. The spot trading is set to be done via a specialized mobile application, released first for Android users. The owners of smartphones with iOS will get the app at a later date, possibly early September.

To enhance customer experience and secure platform`s crypto trading, Rakuten is splitting its customer assets with Rakuten’s own funds. While customer assets remain intact, Rakuten’s fund would go into a trust account, in cooperation with Rakuten Trust Co. Ltd.

A total of three crypto assets can be traded against the Japanese Yen – Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Bitcoin Cash (BCH). Rakuten doesn’t plan to impose any fees on account opening, depositing, or managing crypto assets. Fees will be charged only for withdrawal of Yen and crypto assets. For Yens, the fee is 300 Yen, and for crypto assets, the fees are 0.001 BTC for Bitcoin, 0.01 ETH for Ethereum, and 0.01 BCH for Bitcoin Cash.

Further security enhancements include storing all customer assets to an off-line cold wallet with multisignature private key scheme. Rakuten will also incorporate two-factor authentication when logging in and withdrawing assets.

“For those of our clients, that are already customers of Rakuten Bank, the process of registering with Rakuten Wallet will be simplified. All they need to do is fill up a form and download the application”, Rakuten’s press release states.

Rakuten’s Wallet comes amid a steady growth of Japanese cryptocurrency ecosystem. Japan’s capital – Tokyo, already announced their plans to create a blockchain-based settlement platform similar to SWIFT. The G7 approved Tokyo’s initial plans. Monex Group, one of the leaders in Japanese crypto exchange sector, announced their plans to Join Facebook’s Libra project, after acquiring Coincheck. Coincheck was launched in 2014, but after the 500 million NEM tokens hack in January 2018, their reputation remains jeopardized.

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