Leadership1 publisher3 min readPublished
SBI buys into a licensed Singapore stablecoin processor at Series A scale
SBI Holdings has put capital into Dtcpay through two Singapore vehicles it manages, taking the payment company's completed Series A to $25 million and adding a Japanese incumbent to a licensed stablecoin cap table.
The Board Room · Leadership desk
What happened
- SBI Holdings, the Tokyo-listed financial conglomerate, said on Sept. 18 that it had invested in Singapore-based Dtcpay as the payment company expands its stablecoin merchant network.
- Dtcpay's stablecoin-to-fiat card is connected to Visa, reaching more than 150 million merchant locations, and a Walletconnect integration extends acceptance across more than 700 wallets.
- Separately, SBI Digital Practice and the South Korean insurer Kyobo Life completed a direct yen-won stablecoin pilot that did not route the transfer through the U.S. dollar.
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Why it matters
- exposure A merchant settling through Dtcpay takes counterparty risk on a company whose disclosed equity base is a $25 million Series A, since the swap engine holds both the stablecoin and the fiat leg during a transaction.
- constraint Acceptance at 150 million locations is Visa's footprint with a conversion at the till, so much of the expansion is a card program funded from a stablecoin balance.
- precedent SBI's pattern of buying into already-licensed Singapore platforms makes the same route cheaper to justify for other Asian incumbents than applying for permissions themselves.
The round grew by $15 million between March and September. Dtcpay's first tranche was $10 million, led by Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia & India [3], and the completed Series A now stands at $25 million [2][1]. SBI's capital came through SBI Ventures Asset Pte. Ltd. and the SBI-NTU-Kyobo Digital Innovation Fund, both managed by the group [4]. SBI did not disclose the size of its own contribution, and Dtcpay does not publish its transaction volume [17].
The licence is on the public record. The Monetary Authority of Singapore lists Digital Treasures Center Pte. Ltd., the entity behind the Dtcpay brand, as a Major Payment Institution authorised for account issuance, domestic and cross-border transfers, merchant acquisition, e-money issuance and digital payment token services [5]. The company also holds an Electronic Money Institution licence in Luxembourg [6]. A licence sets out which activities are permitted. The money at risk mid-transaction sits with whoever holds both legs, and Dtcpay's real-time swap engine exchanges and settles stablecoin and fiat on the merchant's behalf [15].
Most of the acceptance breadth in the announcement belongs to other networks. The Visa-linked card converts stablecoin balances into fiat at more than 150 million merchant locations [7], and the WalletConnect integration covers more than 700 wallets [8]. Visa's own stablecoin settlement has passed a $20 billion annualized run rate across more than 160 stablecoin-linked card programs [9]. Divided across those programs, the average settles under $125 million a year [2].
Dtcpay Group Chairman Band Zhao said the company is "strengthening our infrastructure, deepening partnerships with global financial institutions, and expanding into new regulated markets to make stablecoin payments as seamless and trusted as traditional payment rails" [14]. The named Singapore acceptance so far is Metro, which the company calls the country's first department store to take stablecoins, and the luxury hotel Capella Singapore [10]. The new capital is intended for the merchant network, the business portal, consumer app features and entry into further regulated markets over the remaining months of 2026 [16].
The pilot matters over a longer period than the merchant expansion. SBI Digital Practice and Kyobo Life, a South Korean insurer, completed a yen-won stablecoin transfer directly, without routing it through the U.S. dollar [11]. Kyobo appears twice here: in the name of the co-investing fund, and as the insurer on the other side of that transfer [4][11]. SBI took control of Coinhako, a licensed Singapore crypto exchange, in July [12], and the group already runs banking, securities, insurance, asset management, private equity and crypto services [13].
For a finance chief weighing stablecoin acceptance this quarter, whether a Japanese incumbent will stand behind a licensed processor is settled [1]. Which balance sheet absorbs a failed swap is set by the contract, and by the $25 million the company has raised [2]. On the disclosed record, $25 million is not a payments balance sheet: the capital base is a Series A while the acceptance breadth is Visa's [2][7]. The leg that would change what an Asian corridor costs is yen to won without a dollar conversion, and so far there has been one completed transfer between two institutions [11].
What to watch
- Whether Dtcpay publishes a merchant count or settlement volume for its Singapore network as the 2026 expansion proceeds.
- Whether the yen-won transfer moves from a pilot between SBI Digital Practice and Kyobo Life into a priced product for third-party corporates.
- Whether MAS varies or adds permissions for Digital Treasures Center as the merchant book and e-money float grow.