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The First Digital Green Bonds in Japan

JPX

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June 1, 2022 3 min read
The First Digital Green Bonds in Japan

Japan Exchange Group, Inc. (JPX; Director & Representative Executive Officer, Group CEO: Akira Kiyota) announces its decision made on the condition of issuing the 1st Unsecured Bonds (with special pari passu clause among specified bonds and transfer restrictions) (Digitally Tracked Green Bond,) the corporate bond-type security tokens that utilize a blockchain platform (hereinafter, the "digital bond,") as follows.

The Digitally Tracked Green Bonds are the first green bonds in Japan that will use a digital scheme that is currently being developed in close cooperation by four companies: JPX, Hitachi, Ltd. (Hitachi: President & CEO: Keiji Kojima), Nomura Securities Co., Ltd. (Nomura: Representative Director, President: Kentaro Okuda), and BOOSTRY Co., Ltd. (BOOSTRY: Representative Director and CEO: Toshinori Sasaki.) These four companies strive to provide greater convenience and will reflect the opinions offered by investors through this issuance in developing the functions of the Digitally Tracked Green Bonds and enhancing the system.

In addition, we announce that investors listed below informed us of their interest in investing in the digital bond.

To solve these issues, the four companies, JPX, Hitachi, Nomura, and BOOSTRY, have undertaken the development of the Digitally Tracked Green Bonds.

The scheme will allow issuers to obtain green finance indicators, such as power generation volume and CO2 reduction volume, from green power generation facilities without the issuer’s involvement, and will solve issues surrounding the burdens and complexities of connecting operation systems among issuers.

By making it possible to visualize data obtained on green finance indicators and to view and download that data at any time, we will be able to improve the transparency of green projects and make monitoring and other tasks more efficient for investors. A new system developed by Hitachi and JPXI will implement the collection and visualization of data so that investors can check the green finance indicators as they wish without time constraints.

These Digitally Tracked Green Bonds schemes aim to increase the transparency of green investment data and convenience for parties concerned.

Ms. Yuriko Fujita, Line Manager in the Fixed Income Investment Department of The Dai-ichi Life Insurance Company, Limited offered her comments to convey their interest in the investment as follows.

“The Dai-ichi Life Insurance Company Limited (the Company) appreciates this advanced initiative as the Company focuses on digital technologies such as blockchain used for the Bonds and considers that the initiative has potential for future digital technologies that will be utilized more extensively in business, including the data visualization of and continuous access to green financial data.”

In developing the digital tracking function, we will seek the opinion of The Dai-ichi Life Insurance Company, Limited, who will act as a user of the monitoring screen for investor use, as well as other tools. Together with investors, we will take their opinions into consideration in order to make the Digitally Tracked Green Bonds more convenient.

JPX hopes many issuers and investors will be able to participate in this scheme with greater convenience going forward. JPX welcomes those interested in this scheme, from issuers to investors and financial institutions. Please get in touch with the contact office listed below for any inquiries.