Only 2 days ago, one of the biggest social media giants of Japan, LINE, announced a $10 million blockchain venture fund. The announcement came on August 15 and was launched through the company’s subsidiary in Hong Kong.
A new blockchain venture fund
With the blockchain technology and crypto market being on a constant rise, a lot of companies decided to join the trend and explore its possibilities. The most recent example of this is LINE’s new project dedicated to expanding the company and helping it delve deeper into the crypto market.
The venture fund was launched by Unblock Corp, and it is made of funds provided by LVC Corporation, which is LINE sister outfit. In the announcement, the company stated that the fund currently holds $10 million, but is expected to grow even more in the future. However, its growth will be influenced by the change within the blockchain industry.
Part of the announcement stated that:
By launching this new corporate token fund, LINE is aiming to boost the development and adoption of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology.
This move will make LINE the first corporation of this kind to make token investments a formalized process via the corporate fund. The most interesting part of this move is that LINE chose to launch the fund this year, even though the entire year was marked by a bearish market.
The launch of BITBOX exchange
Back in April, the company decided to launch Unblock. Then, only several months later, in July, the platform also launched an official crypto exchange called BITBOX. Even this is not the last of LINE’s plans to tap into the crypto market, as the company still plans to even create its own blockchain.
As mentioned, BITBOX was launched in July of this year, and it is based in Singapore. Back then, LINE stated that BITBOX will add support for around thirty cryptocurrencies, including BTC. However, the company decided to draw the line and not allow fiat-to-crypto trading. Instead, the exchange’s users can only trade their coins for other coins.
And, while the exchange is open for users from all around the world, it is currently unavailable in the US and Japan itself. This is because of the regulatory problems, and many believe that it is a temporary state of things. This is also supported by the fact that LINE went through with submitting an exchange application to the FSA. The application is still under review at the time of writing, and it is currently unknown whether or not it will be approved.
In the meanwhile, BITBOX’s crypto list continues to expand. Its newest addition is TRON (TRX), and its inclusion was confirmed by the exchange itself only a few days ago.
