Online game and tech large Sony Group plans to concern a U.S. dollar-denominated stablecoin subsequent 12 months for use to buy video games and anime inside its digital ecosystem, in accordance with a report from Japanese outlet Nikkei.
This plan is more likely to solely apply to the U.S., because of 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 accumulate a U.S. nationwide banking constitution in October. This license would permit for its subsidiary, Connectia Belief, to interact in “sure specified actions involving cryptocurrency.”
The Unbiased Group 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 accordance with Nikkei, Sony Financial institution hopes that U.S. prospects pays for subscriptions in its stablecoin all through its ecosystem In doing so, it could scale back cost charges typically incurred when utilizing bank cards. Sony Financial institution has partnered with stablecoin agency Bastion, in accordance with Nikkei, which can 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 through cloud computing. Nikkei’s report doesn’t particularly point out PlayStation, however all of Sony’s gaming efforts run by 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 may permit players to personal and switch NFTs. The appliance mentioned these NFTs may embrace in-game skins, avatars, art work, weapons, or “online game expertise.” Sony has but to implement such performance throughout the PlayStation ecosystem, nevertheless.
That very same 12 months, Sony additionally utilized for a patent for a system that tracked digital property 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 large hoped that Soneium would get a slew of PlayStation video games rolling onto it. Nonetheless, as of this writing, no main Sony franchise has launched a crypto recreation 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 recreation, Symbiogenesis.
