Japan’s largest financial conglomerate, SBI Holdings, has confirmed that its subsidiary SBI Ripple Asia will advance technical support for financial services built on the XRP Ledger (XRPL), according to a company press release published on February 20, 2026.
The announcement outlines a basic agreement between SBI Ripple Asia and the Asia Web3 Alliance Japan (AWAJ) to collaborate on the adoption of blockchain technology in traditional financial services, including support for startups seeking to adopt distributed ledger technology and to comply with regulatory frameworks.
The development is the latest evidence of continued institutional interest in XRPL as a settlement and payment technology, particularly within Asia’s increasingly blockchain-friendly regulatory environment.
Expanding XRPL Adoption in Japan
SBI Holdings’ confirmation follows years of ongoing cooperation between the Japanese financial group, Ripple Labs, and the broader XRP ecosystem. SBI Ripple Asia was established as a joint venture to promote blockchain-based solutions across Japan and the wider Asia Pacific region. Earlier initiatives from the venture included collaborations with tourism and commerce sectors to deploy tokenized payment platforms on XRPL.
This latest partnership aims to deepen blockchain integration with traditional financial infrastructure, particularly in cross-border payments, tokenized assets, and enterprise use cases. SBI Ripple Asia will provide technical support for this integration, leveraging the knowledge it has gained in international remittances and payments. Both firms will also primarily provide said support to startups and businesses.
Financial analysts view XRPL’s fast settlement times and low transaction costs as potentially advantageous for institutional settlement use cases, particularly in markets like Japan, which are actively formalizing digital asset regulation. Reports suggest regulators may soon recognize XRP as a financial product under the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA), offering greater legal clarity for blockchain-based financial services.
SBI Holdings’ focus on supporting startups and financial institutions through technical collaboration could play a role in expanding XRPL use cases from remittances and payments to more advanced financial products in the coming years. Meanwhile, XRPL continues to see heightened adoption beyond Asia, as French banking giant Société Générale recently launched a euro-denominated stablecoin, EUR CoinVertible, on the XRP Ledger.
SBI Holdings’ Strategic Positioning and Market Context
Despite widespread speculation online about SBI Holdings’ direct holdings of XRP tokens, company leadership has clarified that SBI does not hold billions of dollars in XRP. Instead, its exposure comes primarily from a roughly 9% equity stake in Ripple Labs.
SBI Holdings’ CEO Yoshitaka Kitao has described the company’s blockchain strategy, which includes support for XRPL technology, as a core component of the group’s broader technology vision, pairing blockchain with artificial intelligence as key pillars of future financial innovation.
Following the announcement, the XRP price recovered from a 1.5% slump over the last 24 hours and is now trading at $1.42. Despite the muted action, XRP continues to find widespread utility across DeFi applications such as Flare Network’s FXRP, which has almost reached a supply milestone of 100 million tokens.
Additionally, XRP ETFs performed better than their counterparts this week, with only $222,300 in net outflows, compared to $404 million for BTC ETFs and $123.3 million for ETH ETFs.
Temitope Olajide
The CoinRemark Team
