Nexon bets big on Bitcoin with $100m buy

Last week, Nexon Co. announced its $100 million bitcoin purchase, joining a hoard of companies adding crypto to their balance sheets.

The South Korean-Japanese video game company bought 1,717 BTC at an average price of ~$58,226 each, including fees and expenses. The purchase makes up less than 2% of Nexon’s total cash and cash equivalents and is the largest-ever buy of any crypto made by a company traded in Tokyo.

Owen Mahoney, Nexon’s CEO said in a statement, “Our purchase of bitcoin reflects a disciplined strategy for protecting shareholder value and for maintaining the purchasing power of our cash assets.” He continued, “In the current economic environment, we believe Bitcoin offers long-term stability and liquidity while maintaining the value of our cash for future investments.”

Despite having been an early leader in Bitcoin acceptance, Japan has been relatively slow in catching on the institutional investment trend we’ve seen from global companies like MicroStrategy and Tesla.

With inflation on the rise all over the world, Mahoney said he sees bitcoin as a “form of cash likely to retain its value, even if it is not yet widely-recognised as such.”