The Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG) has announced that it will put its native digital currency and stablecoin MUFG Coin into practical usage by the end of 2019, according to Cointelegraph Japan.
The rollout was first disclosed to national newspaper Asahi Shimbun by new president Kanetsugu Mike. The largest bank in Japan is also the fifth largest in the world, and is now going to be the first in Japan to issue a digital asset and currency. MUFG Coin will be a blockchain-based stablecoin pegged at parity to the Japanese yen (JPY).
Its obvious focus will be as a functional currency, with bank account holders able to download an app that will automatically convert deposits into MUFG Coin. Some 1,500 company employees have joined in on trialing MUFG Coin since its inception two years ago.
Last year, US tech company Akamai was taken on to design a blockchain capable of handling 1 million transactions per second, boosting speed and reducing transaction feeds through distributed ledger technology. The partnership was a watershed moment that underlined growing corporate interest in blockchain tech, as they talked up blockchain’s ability to “strengthen protection against falsification of transactions and drastically lower costs.”
In 2018, former MUFG president Nobuyuku Hirano suggested that the bank was hoping to “overcome issues of virtual currencies and create a highly useful currency” with MUFG Coin. The banking giant has a recorded total assets of JPY 306 trillion (USD 2.76 trillion), and maintains operations in 40 other countries.
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