Laser Digital said on 21st August, 2026 that its Japanese subsidiary has completed registration as a crypto asset exchange service provider, the first new entrant Japan has registered in about four years. Nomura, Japan’s largest investment bank, owns the firm.
Key Points
- Laser Digital is the first crypto asset exchange service provider Japan has registered in about four years.
- Nomura created the firm in 2022 to build out the bank’s digital asset business.
- The Japanese unit will first supply liquidity to domestic virtual asset service providers, with institutional trading to follow.
- Japan passed a law in July that moves crypto under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act.
- A 2026 Nomura and Laser Digital survey found 79% of respondents planned to invest in crypto assets within three years.
Laser Digital Clears a Four-Year Registration Gap
Laser Digital will start by supplying liquidity to domestic virtual asset service providers, the firms already licensed to serve customers in Japan, the company said in its registration announcement. Institutional trading is meant to follow.
The firm has set no launch date for that second phase and has not described the full range of services it plans to offer. The distinction shapes how the news should read. Registration authorizes the entity, and it establishes nothing about when Japanese institutions can trade through it.
Nomura built Laser Digital in 2022 and has since added asset management, trading and venture investment arms around it. The unit won a full crypto business license in Dubai in 2023 and runs Bitcoin and Ethereum funds aimed at institutional buyers. Its Japan effort began in October 2025 with preliminary discussions with the Financial Services Agency (FSA), Japan’s integrated financial regulator, over broker-dealer services for banks, crypto companies and exchanges.
Laser Digital Japan is now registered under Japan’s Payment Services Act, the country’s first new Crypto Asset Exchange Service Provider registration in four yearshttps://t.co/v4Ha0VWZr0
— Laser Digital (@LaserDigital_) August 21, 2026
Japan Moves Crypto From Payments Law to Securities Law
Japan passed legislation in July classifying digital assets as financial products under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act, placing them in a category alongside stocks and bonds. Crypto sat under the Payment Services Act for years before that change.
The amended framework applies insider trading restrictions to crypto transactions and annual disclosure duties to issuers of certain digital assets. Penalties for operating without registration rise once the rules apply, which is the enforcement edge that gives a Japanese registration commercial value. Japanese institutions already routing crypto trades through offshore desks can check now whether their counterparty holds a domestic registration, because that unregistered status carries a higher cost after implementation.
Tax treatment moves on a slower clock. Japan currently taxes individual crypto profits as miscellaneous income at rates reaching about 55%, and the planned system would place qualifying gains under separate taxation at roughly 20%. Those provisions are expected to apply from January 2028, since enforcement falls in Japan’s 2027 fiscal year. The country has separately adopted the OECD crypto tax reporting framework, which from January 2026 requires platforms to collect and report cross-border user data.
Institutional Demand Is Running Ahead of the Plumbing
A 2026 survey by Nomura and Laser Digital found 79% of respondents planned to invest in crypto assets within the next three years. That number explains the sequencing. The buyers exist, and the regulated pipes that reach them are still being laid.
Jez Mohideen, co-founder and CEO of Laser Digital, said Japan’s digital assets market “is entering a new phase of maturity” and that institutional investors need “trusted counterparties and infrastructure designed specifically for their requirements.“
Rival Japanese brokerages read the same demand. SBI Securities and Rakuten Securities were developing crypto investment trust products internally by May, while Nomura, Daiwa and firms tied to SMBC and Mizuho examined similar offerings. Those trusts would let Japanese investors hold crypto exposure inside conventional securities accounts.
The July law also creates the legal basis for domestic spot crypto exchange-traded funds. Japan Exchange Group has weighed local listings as early as 2027, though no spot Bitcoin ETF approval has been confirmed. Bitcoin ETF inflow data shows what that channel has drawn in other markets.
Three questions stay open:
- When Laser Digital’s institutional trading service launches and which assets it covers?
- Whether the FSA clears spot crypto ETFs for domestic listing inside the 2027 window Japan Exchange Group has discussed?
- Whether the roughly 20% separate tax rate reaches holdings beyond individual gains?
CoinLaw’s Takeaway
The registration is a sequencing move. Supplying liquidity to already licensed Japanese firms is the lowest friction way to open a regulated business, and it places Laser Digital inside the market before the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act rules take effect. Firms holding registrations when insider trading rules and disclosure duties arrive will be the ones institutional money can legally reach.
The four year gap deserves the closer look. Japan built one of the earliest crypto licensing regimes and then admitted almost no new operators, and a drought that long narrows the pool of venues institutions can legally use. A bank owned entrant clearing the bar first may signal that applicants carrying a large parent balance sheet satisfy the FSA most easily, which sets the profile other applicants will be measured against.
