Metaplanet's brokerage deal 'badly undersells' plans for bitcoin-backed 'Bitbonds,' Benchmark says

Benchmark argued that investors are underestimating the importance of Metaplanet's recent acquisition of Siiibo Securities, saying the brokerage could lay the groundwork for bitcoin-backed "Bitbonds" and a new tokenized fixed-income market in Japan.

"When Metaplanet closed its ¥2.1 billion (~$13 million) acquisition of Siiibo Securities ... the market largely read the deal as a modest bolt-on," Benchmark analyst Mark Palmer wrote. "Our discussion last week with Dylan LeClair ... made it clear that this reading badly undersells the company's plans for the firm it acquired."

Palmer noted the acquisition gives Metaplanet a Type-1 Financial Instrument Business Operator license, which allows it to structure and distribute securities in Japan. These types of licenses normally take a couple of quarters or more to file for and obtain from scratch, according to LeClair.

So rather than acting as a funding channel for Metaplanet's own bitcoin (BTC) purchases, the brokerage will become the foundation for a new bitcoin-backed fixed-income market for tokenized bonds that the company is calling "Bitbonds."

LeClair told Benchmark that Metaplanet's longer-term goal is for Metaplanet Securities to become a platform where a company looking to adopt a bitcoin treasury strategy could issue debt to fund its BTC purchases.

The firms said it envisions launching these bitcoin-backed bonds yielding roughly 4% to 6% and eventually moving them onchain with stablecoin settlement, then building a secondary market over the next few years.

The report said that this is an extension of Metaplanet's "Project Nova" roadmap, which looks to expand the company beyond a corporate bitcoin treasury by acquiring businesses with cash flows and building bitcoin-native financial infrastructure.

"Our takeaway is that the market is still pricing Metaplanet as a passive bitcoin proxy while the company is preparing to execute on a plan to bootstrap an entire capital market," Palmer wrote.

LeClair summed up the effort as building "a new kind of financial institution from Japan, with bitcoin at its core."

Benchmark maintained its Buy rating and ¥405 (roughly $2.47) price target on Metaplanet's stock. The firm currently holds 43,000 BTC worth nearly $2.8 billion and is the third-largest publicly traded bitcoin treasury company, according to The Block's data.