Monex To Revitalise Coincheck Through Shock Acquisition

The big news this morning is that Monex, a Japanese brokerage company are in line for a huge acquisition of the remains of Coincheck, the Japanese cryptocurrency exchange which was hit by a devastating attack at the start of 2018. The value of the acquisition is not yet known, however despite the hack which saw Coincheck struggle through the start of 2018, the exchange still boasts one of the largest customer bases within the cryptocurrency world, meaning that rumours suggest the acquisition by Monex is costing the company several billion Yen (¥). Through this acquisition Monex will be aiming to rebuild the reputation of Coincheck through establishing a safe and secure environment for cryptocurrency exchanges. As we know, the Financial Services Agency in Japan have had problems with Coinchecks operations, demanding that they improve their service several times. Considering their hack is the reason the Financial Standards Agency have imposed these measures, you might argue that Coincheck do have some responsibility for improving the environment for its customers. A sale to Monex might then look like an attempt to abandon ship. Ultimately, if Monex don’t act quickly to clean up the mess left behind in the wake of the attack, the FSA will no doubt come down hard on Coincheck, regardless of the acquisition by Monex. In short, I don’t believe Monex will be granted a lot of time to improve the exchange’s service. The Japan Times expects the current President and Founder of Coincheck, Koichiro Wada, to step down this week, making way for a new leadership team. This is imperative for Monex, since they are going to need to make changes quickly. Whilst there has been no official word from Monex or Coincheck about this acquisition, the big Japanese news outlets are certain that an announcement is to come, potentially as soon as this week. Monex did confirm this morning that they are considering the acquisition, but no official decisions had yet been made. If this is going ahead, I believe Monex need to act very quickly if they want to keep hold of Coinchecks customer base, the FSA are tightening up regulations every day. If this acquisition is going to cost as much as the experts believe it will, it would be un-wise for Monex to go into this at a standard pace, imagine being forced to close just days after spending billions of Yen on the project, it certainly wouldn’t be ideal, to say the least. Featured Image Original Source: Pixabay