Alpaca Completes Acquisition of Japanese Broker-Dealer AlpacaJapan

Mar 30, 2023

The move seeks to expand the global presence of the crypto and stock investing platform.

Nothing will change for current customers at AlpacaJapan.

Alpaca, a crypto and stock investing platform, announced on Tuesday that it acquired AlpacaJapan, a Japanese licensed broker-dealer. According to the press release, no changes will be made for current AlpacaJapan customers, and it will continue to operate as an FSA-licensed broker-dealer in the country.

Businesses and developers in Japan can soon launch stock investing products through Alpaca Broker API, and algorithmic traders can use stock trading APIs.

“Expanding into Japan presents obvious opportunities and advantages. Japan is the third largest economy in the world with the second largest household asset size, and is experiencing a recent acceleration and surge in money digitization adoption. Together with the AlpacaJapan team, we’re excited to accelerate opening financial services to the people in Japan through our battle-tested embedded investing product and are looking forward to working closely with Japanese businesses and businesses entering into the Japanese market,” Yoshi Yokokawa, the Co-Founder and CEO of Alpaca, commented.

Comments from AlpacaJapan's CEO

Morifumi Yotsumoto, the CEO of AlpacaJapan, added: “We’re excited to join Alpaca and begin offering Broker API and Trading API to Independent Financial Advisors, various types of trader and developer communities, and individual investors in Japan,” said Morifumi Yotsumoto, the CEO of AlpacaJapan. “We’ve already begun collaborations with Alpaca and are preparing for a joint release of a new US stock product for Japanese investors. As a part of the globally distributed team at Alpaca, we will continue to strive to provide cutting-edge products to Japanese investors.”

Crypto and stock trading are provided by Alpaca, along with real-time market data and end-to-end brokerage infrastructure. A number of leading investors in the industry have backed Alpaca, including Portage Ventures, Spark Capital, Social Leverage, Tribe Capital, Horizons Ventures, Eldridge, Positive Sum, Elefund and Y Combinator. The Alpaca Securities LLC offers securities, and the Alpaca Crypto LLC offers crypto services.