Startale launches Japan’s first corporate bond paid in yen stablecoin JPYSC, covering both interest and principal

Startale Japan has issued what it says is the country’s first digital corporate bond to pay both interest and principal in a yen stablecoin. The bond uses JPYSC, issued by SBI Shinsei Trust Bank and pegged 1:1 to the yen, and is open only to individual and corporate investors in Japan.

The bond, announced by Startale and reported by Bitcoin.com News, uses JPYSC, a yen-denominated stablecoin issued by SBI Shinsei Trust Bank, and is available exclusively to individual and corporate investors in Japan.

The issuance gives stablecoins a new role in Japanese corporate finance, moving beyond their more established use cases in crypto trading, payments and remittances.

Yen stablecoin enters corporate bond market

The Startale bond places the Yen stablecoin at the center of the payment structure rather than simply using blockchain technology to record or represent the security.

Under the arrangement, JPYSC will be distributed to investors for both interest payments and the eventual repayment of principal. That makes the stablecoin the payment mechanism for the bond rather than an additional blockchain feature attached to a conventional financial product.

Startale Japan is the legal issuer of the bond, while access is limited to investors based in Japan. Overseas investors are not eligible to participate under the announced structure.

JPYSC is designed to maintain a 1:1 value with the Japanese yen and is classified as a Type 3 Electronic Payment Instrument under Japan’s Payment Services Act.

SBI Shinsei Trust Bank issues the stablecoin and manages the trust assets supporting it. SBI VC Trade acts as the issuance trustor and is responsible for issuance and distribution, while Startale Group provides the underlying technology supporting the project.

The structure gives the Yen stablecoin a direct connection to corporate fundraising and investment, potentially demonstrating how tokenized payment instruments can interact with established financial products.

Startale tests onchain corporate finance

Startale Group CEO Sota Watanabe said the project is intended to explore how blockchain-based infrastructure could expand options for companies and investors.

“By bringing finance onchain, we want to create new options for corporate fundraising and individual investment,” — Sota Watanabe, CEO, Startale Group.

Watanabe described the bond as a pilot for using JPYSC to make actual interest and principal payments. The companies involved plan to use the experience gained from the issuance to examine broader applications for the technology in Japan.

The approach effectively puts the Yen stablecoin through a real-world test in corporate finance. Rather than being used only for digital-asset transactions, JPYSC will be required to function as part of a scheduled financial obligation involving investors and a corporate issuer.

That distinction is important because the bond tests whether stablecoin infrastructure can operate within a conventional financial product from issuance through repayment.

However, the available announcement does not provide several key financial details. The total size of the bond, coupon rate, maturity date and individual investment limits were not disclosed.

Without those figures, the financial scale of the experiment cannot be determined from the announcement alone.

Yen stablecoin model faces adoption test

The Startale issuance is not the first attempt to connect tokenized corporate debt with stablecoins.

In November 2024, crypto market maker B2C2 issued an onchain corporate bond with PV01. That bond was tokenized on Ethereum and denominated in the U.S. dollar stablecoin USDC.

Another example emerged in January 2026, when Société Générale’s digital-asset arm SG-FORGE conducted a trial with Swift involving the settlement of tokenized bonds using its euro stablecoin EURCV.

The Japanese project nevertheless represents a distinct experiment because the Yen stablecoin is being used for both interest and principal payments in a domestic corporate bond.

Keeping the issuance within Japan also gives regulators and market participants an opportunity to observe how stablecoin-based settlement functions in a controlled domestic environment.

For Startale, the project could provide practical information about the advantages and limitations of incorporating stablecoins into conventional financial infrastructure.

The longer-term significance of the Yen stablecoin will depend less on whether the underlying technology can process payments and more on whether investors and financial institutions are willing to use it at scale.

Yen stablecoin adoption could determine next phase

The Startale bond offers a direct test of whether a Yen stablecoin can move from the digital-asset ecosystem into mainstream corporate finance.

Its structure is relatively straightforward: Startale Japan issues the bond, JPYSC is used for interest and principal payments, SBI Shinsei Trust Bank provides the stablecoin and manages its backing assets, and Startale Group supplies the technology.

The experiment could help demonstrate whether tokenized settlement provides meaningful advantages over traditional yen payment infrastructure.

But adoption remains the central question.

Investors accustomed to receiving bond payments in ordinary yen may have little reason to change their preferred payment method unless stablecoin settlement provides clear benefits. Those could include faster settlement, greater programmability or closer integration with onchain financial systems, although the supplied announcement does not quantify such benefits.

The Yen stablecoin therefore faces a practical test beyond its technical design. JPYSC must function reliably within an actual financial product while gaining acceptance from the investors and institutions expected to use it.

If the pilot proves workable, Startale and its partners could use the results to explore additional applications for stablecoins and tokenized finance in Japan.