Japan's LINE Corporation announced a new subsidiary that will launch a cryptocurrency exchange on its popular mobile messaging app and promote research and development of the blockchain technology, even as safety concerns are rife after the recent massive hack of the Coincheck crypto exchange.
The new company, LINE Financial, is a follow-up to its mobile money transfer and payment service LINE Pay, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.
The Tokyo-based LINE Corp is the Japanese unit of the South Korean internet search giant Naver Corporation.
LINE Pay, with 40 million users, saw its global annual transaction volume exceed JPY 450 billion in 2017.
LINE Financial will be key to the preparations to provide a variety of financial services, including a place to exchange and transact virtual currencies, loans, and insurance - all from the LINE app, the company said.
The application process for registration as a virtual currency exchange has already been started with Japan's Financial Services Agency, and it is currently under review, LINE said.
Japan reportedly has 16 licensed cryptocurrency exchanges and several are awaiting approval.
The LINE messaging service already has a virtual currency or coin that is used in games and to buy content, mainly attractive and expressive stickers.
Banking on the high-level of security that it has cultivated for use in its messaging app, LINE aims to actively promote research and development of technologies such as blockchain and to provide a safe financial service to its users.
Japanese regulators are monitoring the cryptocurrency space closely after it emerged on January 26 that 523 million NEM coins were stolen from Coincheck, a leading cryptocurrency exchange.
Coincheck said it will repay the nearly 260,000 affected users in Japanese yen.
The FSA ordered Coincheck to study the security flaws and beef up its protective measures, and report back by February 13.
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December 19, 2025 15:10 ET U.S. inflation data and interest rate decisions by major central banks were the highlights of this busy week for economics news flow. Employment data and survey results on the housing markets also gained attention in the U.S. In Europe, the European Central Bank and Bank of England announced their policy decisions and macroeconomic projections.