Save money and enjoy Bitcoin! Japan's SBI Shinsei Bank's super aggressive customer acquisition tactic: interest can be exchanged for cryptocurrencies

Japan’s SBI Shinsei Bank announced it will roll out a “Cryptocurrency Cashback Program,” allowing depositors to convert their deposit interest amounts into virtual currencies such as BTC and ETH, with a pilot starting on June 10.

According to a report by Nikkei, Japan’s financial giant SBI Group’s subsidiary, “SBI Shinsei Bank,” is deploying a high-impact customer-acquisition strategy. The company plans to launch a “Cryptocurrency Cashback Program” this autumn, enabling depositors to convert their deposit interest into cryptocurrencies.

The report says that, in addition to receiving the statutory interest income they would normally earn, SBI Shinsei Bank’s regular deposit customers can also obtain an exchange coupon equivalent to 20% of their deposit interest, which can be used to exchange for major cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Ripple (XRP).

However, if customers want to redeem the related rewards, they must first open an account on SBI Group’s cryptocurrency trading platform, SBI VC Trade, to complete the exchange process.

CoinPost reports that, to warm up for the official launch in autumn, SBI Shinsei Bank will first start a three-month pilot program on June 10. The coverage includes ordinary current-savings deposits, as well as fixed-term deposit options with terms ranging from 3 months to 5 years.

How much cashback can you get in practice? Taking the pilot program as an example, if you deposit 300,000 yen, you can earn a cryptocurrency exchange coupon worth about 500 yen; if you deposit 30,000,000 yen, you can earn a cryptocurrency exchange coupon worth 20,000 yen.

Although the amounts aren’t especially high, for traditional bank customers who have never previously touched cryptocurrencies, this “no-barrier access to digital assets” model may become an important entry point for attracting users to enter the cryptocurrency market.

In fact, this cashback program is just the latest step in SBI Group’s accelerated layout of blockchain and crypto-asset business in recent years.

SBI Holdings Chairman and President Yoshitaka Kitao revealed last month that the group has entered a preliminary negotiation stage and is preparing to acquire a portion of the shares of Japan’s cryptocurrency exchange Bitbank.

What’s more, rumors in the market in May this year said that SBI Securities is teaming up with Rakuten Securities to actively develop a “cryptocurrency investment trust fund” product, which will be directly sold to retail investors in the future.

Further reading:
Japan’s SBI and Rakuten move into crypto trusts! The first batch supports Bitcoin products, and retail investors can place orders directly in the App

• This article is reprinted with permission from: “Block Talk”
• Original title: “Save Money and Enjoy Bitcoin! Japan’s SBI Shinsei Bank to Launch ‘Cryptocurrency Cashback Program’”
• Original author: Block Sister Mel