Briefly
Sony Group plans for U.S. clients to pay for online game subscriptions and different content material utilizing its personal stablecoin, in line with Japanese publication Nikkei.
It comes after its banking division, Sony Financial institution, filed for a U.S. banking license in October.
Sony launched its personal Ethereum layer-2 community earlier this 12 months, and has filed a number of blockchain-related patents.
Online game and tech big Sony Group plans to difficulty a U.S. dollar-denominated stablecoin subsequent 12 months for use to buy video games and anime inside its digital ecosystem, in line with a report from Japanese outlet Nikkei.
This plan is more likely to solely apply to the U.S., due to the passing of the GENIUS Act earlier this 12 months—a invoice that paved a transparent regulatory path for issuing stablecoins within the nation.
It comes after Sony’s banking division, Sony Financial institution, filed to amass a U.S. nationwide banking constitution in October. This license would enable for its subsidiary, Connectia Belief, to interact in “sure specified actions involving cryptocurrency.”
The Impartial Neighborhood Bankers of America (ICBA) later urged the nationwide commerce affiliation to block Sony’s bid, claiming it was exploiting regulatory loopholes to keep away from conventional banking oversight.
In keeping with Nikkei, Sony Financial institution hopes that U.S. clients can pay for subscriptions in its stablecoin all through its ecosystem In doing so, it might scale back cost charges usually incurred when utilizing bank cards. Sony Financial institution has partnered with stablecoin agency Bastion, in line with Nikkei, which is able to present the infrastructure for the Sony stablecoin.
Sony’s thriving PlayStation platform contains digital video games and subscriptions for the PlayStation 5 console, together with PC video games and others that may stream to varied units by way of cloud computing. Nikkei’s report doesn’t particularly point out PlayStation, however all of Sony’s gaming efforts run by means of that model. Sony Group additionally operates the favored Crunchyroll anime streaming service.
Decrypt reached out to Sony for remark relating to the reported plans, however didn’t instantly obtain a response.
This isn’t the primary time that Sony has flirted with crypto implementations.
In 2021, Sony utilized for a U.S. patent to create standardized digital infrastructure that will enable avid gamers to personal and switch NFTs. The appliance mentioned these NFTs may embody in-game skins, avatars, art work, weapons, or “online game abilities.” Sony has but to implement such performance throughout the PlayStation ecosystem, nonetheless.
That very same 12 months, Sony additionally utilized for a patent for a system that tracked digital belongings in video video games utilizing a blockchain. And in January 2025, Sony and associate Startale Group launched the Ethereum layer-2 community Soneium into mainnet.
Followers of the tech big hoped that Soneium would get a slew of PlayStation video games rolling onto it. Nevertheless, as of this writing, no main Sony franchise has launched a crypto sport on Soneium. Fairly, it has develop into a community with NFT music collections and a rising library of smaller video games, plus it hosted a tie-in with Sq. Enix’s now-shuttered crypto sport, Symbiogenesis.
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