SBI Holdings Inc

TSE:8473

Earnings Call Transcript 2021-Q1

[Yoshitaka Kitao, executive]

Thank you very much for taking time out of your very busy schedule for the briefing session on the financial results for the first quarter of this fiscal year. And thank you very much for your continued support and cooperation for our business operation.

I know that there are 29 people attending in the venue, and there are 73 people who are attending through the teleconferencing system. So in total, we understand that there are about 100 -- a little over 100 people attending this conference.

I would like to begin my presentation. Regarding the numbers, needless to say, I understand that you have already reviewed the numbers in results. For the quarter, revenue was JPY 111.1 billion, up 20% from a year earlier. Profit before income tax expense was JPY 27.757 billion, up 37.3% and the JPY 20.279 billion was recorded as the profit for the period, up 48%, and the profit attributable to owners of the company was JPY 16.284 billion, up 39.4%. According to the consensus among analysts, JPY 16.6 billion was the consensus as the profit before income tax expense. So the result was well above that by about JPY 10 billion.

Regarding the ROE times -- for annualization, 13.2% was -- is expected. And compared to the last fiscal year, the ROE dipped a little bit. However, our target -- the maintenance of the ROE over 10% was our target. And that has -- the result exceeded our target.

By segment, Financial Services business revenue grew 24.5% to reach about JPY 70 billion, and a 44% increase was shown in the profit before income tax expenses. And Asset Management business revenue was JPY 39.7 billion, up 21.2%, and profit before income tax expense was almost flat, up 1 percentage point to reach JPY 11.99 billion. Biotechnology-related business, although still making losses, but the loss amount has been significantly reduced, up JPY 2.187 billion and in terms of revenue, which grew 7.9% year-on-year.

And different from the usual briefing sessions, as I said earlier, compared to the consensus among analysts, the actual results exceeded market consensus. What were the driving force? This is my own analysis, which I would like to share with you today. Factors that contributed to favorable financial results in the midst of the COVID-19 situation are listed here. This shows the annual growth rate for OECD countries for GDP. Here is the forecast values, and it is expected to see the significant decrease turning into the negative growth.

Under this situation, you may think that you weren't able to achieve good results. That is the usual thinking. But on the other hand, this is the monetary base trend for Japan and U.S. As you know, monetary base is the volume of the currency available in the market and the reserves are held by the BOJ for commercial banks, and the commercial banks savings of the currencies in the safe. And these are in total called monetary base. And this is fluctuating as such, not only in Japan but also in the U.S., the monetary base has been significantly increased.

Although, the economy is expected to grow negatively, but irrespective of that forecast, the stock prices were very strong. Yes, once in March or April, there was a significant drop in stock prices because of the COVID-19 crisis. But after that, we have seen rapid recovery in stock prices. And these are -- this is considered to be one factor, making the results different from the forecast and after seeing the sharp drop in the stock prices in March. So based upon the fair value valuation for the results ended March this year, we were significantly affected by the fair value assessment, but some of which has been recovered.

In our Asset side, as I said earlier, based on the year-to-year comparison, we have achieved almost flat results in the Asset Management. At least, we can say that we didn't have a negative growth in Asset. And here is the number of businesses sold or M&A activities, which have shown increase. Why? Because asset prices have been down, of course, these are -- they're operating companies or financial institutions, many of them who would target to capture those dropped value -- asset values. And number of businesses sold and M&A deals, these have increased during the half year. But in terms of value, the value has decreased by 32% because of the lack of the large-scale deals, given these situation. Well, people wanted to pursue a good bargain and also, we are seeing then increasing number of smaller-scale deals.

Given the next factor, recovery of the equity market. Major security firms are compared in terms of their operating income. As I explained, a 37.3% growth has been recorded in the operating income for us, and Nomura also grew significantly. In the U.S. or overseas markets or overall, businesses have shown a steady growth, particularly transactions in bonds seems to be very strong for them. On a net basis, Nihonbashi land is expected to be sold probably that will affect. But this is the comparison on the operating income line. Daiwa hasn't disclosed yet. SMBC Nikko, JPY 6.968 billion. And online securities, except for au Kabucom, the growth rate has been significant. For au Kabucom, well, according to what the leaders had said, because of the significant decrease of the commissions fee, and they said that this is the major factor. And we also offer the discount in the commission rate, but we have made such a big difference from them. Matsui, which conducts churnings a lot, did have a strong growth.

And based on the quarterly operating income, if we see the trend by quarter, there has been ups and down. And others are making a chunk, but we are exceeding them outstandingly. We have been over the length of time, we have been maintaining the good high growth rates or the high operating income level. And 48.4% growth has been recorded in terms of the individual brokerage trading value on other daily average here. The stock brokerage trading value has increased 83.9% year-on-year, and commissions grew 71.7% year-on-year.

Furthermore, when it comes to Asset Management, this NASDAQ actually has been stronger than the trend seen in Dow Jones in the United States. As you know, NASDAQ is another composite index of high-tech companies. High-tech companies, the chips were traded very strongly in the U.S. NASDAQ composite index breaks record high. In Japan, after going public, for example, BASE Inc., in June -- in -- on October 25, 2019, the IPO price was JPY 1,300. But since then, we have seen continuous growth in price, freee as well. Their IPO price was JPY 2,000 per share, but it increased significantly, over JPY 5,000. And AI inside on December 25, 2019, public offering price was JPY 3,600. But as you can see on the graph, these names have shown the growth in stock prices. That means that investors purchased, bought these companies a lot. Through the FinTech Fund, we have proactively made investment in these companies.

What about the bond market? As I have said, when I referred to Nomura Securities example, and securities companies or rather commercial banks, they have become, they are not any more investment bankers like Goldman and Morgan Stanley, and they have made a lot of money out of these trading. But when it comes to -- on the contrary, traditional banks, because of the higher credit costs, and these are accumulated as the provisions. Therefore, 51.4% decrease was recorded for JPMorgan Chase and Citi recorded 72.6% decrease.

And today -- yesterday, SMBC's numbers were disclosed, and they have to provide for provisions. The other day, the President of Mizuho came to see me and we had a discussion. Over the last 1 month or so, JPY 10 trillion has been extended as loans from the government for -- mainly for SM, small and medium-sized businesses, the lendings have to be offered. And that is encouraged by the government. So JPY 10 trillion are we able to recover, collect these lendings in a short-term period and many people have to review the credit applications. I think that they struggled a lot and worked very hard in order to save the Japanese economy as a whole. I think that many people made -- worked very hard. For banks having a lot of cumulative bad loans and who will help them? I know that the government would not do anything to help them. So what will happen going forward, traditional banks including major banks, what will be the future developments? We are putting -- paying a close attention.

And bond market volatility has been very significant with a lot of ups and downs, but people are making money. But traders -- but regarding the such a revenue depending on such volatility in the market may disappear soon. So we believe that we are not going to take this approach. This is the basic principle of our business operation in our group. With very high certainty, we -- I made my own judgment based upon the collected information from various sources. If there is such a high certainty, we can rely on such source of income. And with limited risk, SBI SECURITIES, related to our overall investment activities, they do not do such approach. They just focus on the retail business.

So net banks earnings, in principle, we have seen steady growth in earnings and although the official announcement is yet to be made, but ordinary income has shown a steady growth. First quarter result is not disclosed yet. On 31st of July, they will disclose. So tomorrow, they will disclose the results. The SBI Sumishin Net Bank is not doing the corporate or business lending. So P2P or individual retail and also mortgage housing loans are the business -- main business models, not only relying on the mortgage, of course, but these are the core businesses of SBI Sumishin Net Bank, which have generated steady growth in earnings.

I said in bond market, for example, Sri Lankan government bonds in the bond market, we thought that -- I thought that this will make money. You may think that you cannot make money out of this, but we made JPY 500 million. The dollar-denominated Sri Lankan government bonds were devalued, discounted and in Sri Lanka, we made investment into 2 securities firms in Sri Lanka -- Sri Lankan securities firms and securities markets, and also information can be obtained from Sri Lankan market. And Sri Lankans, those people who had a lot of experience in the investment banks, have been retained by us. And we have opened our office in Sri Lanka. And I am also serving as a member of the Board for the listed company in Sri Lanka.

Therefore, we are able to get the information from the market and the central bank correspondence to BOJ in Sri Lanka or members of the cabinet, particularly a member of the cabinet in charge of finance. We can gather information from various sources in order -- before making decision in embarking on business. So in that sense, we have been very careful in SBI Insurance and SBI Life Insurance. We could make the JPY 2 billion on as an investment profit.

Foreign exchange markets, not so much as the volatility recorded in March. The volatility has calmed, but the trading volume remained robust. And for us, FX-related businesses are expanding rapidly. Almost all the major players in Korea are the customers of our liquidity markets and YJFX -- Yahoo!'s YJFX, they are dealing with us. And the Central Tanshi Co. is also doing business with us. So through liquidity market as a platform, we believe that this is excellent platform. And that is also recognized by the market. That's why we have seen growth in this business.

Trading revenue, SBI SECURITIES trading revenue, how are we going to increase this revenue, making the commission to 0, it is very important. For example, VC Trade as a subsidiary of SBI SECURITIES. From the second quarter, from last fiscal year, we have held this company at sub and JPY 3.369 billion. So this is the contribution from this SBI VC Trade. As such, trading revenue grew 76.9% year-on-year. The crypto-asset trading and FX trading revenue, and those are increased significantly through the liberalization -- towards the liberalization of the commission rate.

So for SBA VC Trade, it's implementing various measures to expand its business in response to revisions in the Payment Services Act. Furthermore, currently, asset prices are declining. So like I mentioned earlier, because we're in this phase, we would like to promote our acquisition strategy. Before, I talked about certain areas where we are interested to do acquisitions in. One was -- the one acquisition was Rheos Capital Works. As of June 30, we acquired 51.28%. Rheos Capital Works has a famous Hifumi brand investment trust product. For us this is a very important asset in order to grow our investment trust business.

Also for cryptocurrencies, global market maker, B2C2 was an entity we invested in as well. We will do it over 2 phases. As of September, we will invest about 1/3 and increase that to 90% by the month of December. So B2C2 will be part of our group, which means that our cryptocurrency business has the potential of expanding globally. So when you think about our future, we believe this is a very important measure that we are engaging in. And this was also in the press.

Livestar Securities. Some people may think that we made a very small acquisition. However, they implemented a waiver of margin trading fees and lowered its rates on margin trading. The rates are far lower than us. So the traders support this company quite strongly. So they are a very unique securities company. We acquired all shares. They have 180,000 accounts, and customer deposits totals JPY 250 billion. So it's a securities firm for commissions-sensitive traders. So SBI SECURITIES, Neo-Moba and now livestar Securities are the entities through which we would like to generate synergies by segmenting our customer base.

Furthermore for prime -- SBI Prime Securities, which is a company within our group, it is a matching business. On top of retail investors, they will be pursuing institutional investors as well. So they would like to generate new revenue sources through SOR and dark pool transactions. To that end, this was very strategic and meaningful as an acquisition. For the SBI Insurance Group, they are mainly focusing on SSI. And they go after good opportunities. This time around, they will acquire all shares of Joguchi Safety SSI. Once we acquire them, the businesses acquired in the past had steadily grown. So we will generate synergies with the new acquisition. And for SSI, product design is pretty free. And it's easier, relatively speaking, to get approval. And it's a very nimble service that we provide to our customers.

So we have been making these acquisitions. We are still thinking about acquiring 3 more entities right now. We haven't yet concluded our scrutiny over these deals. So we haven't yet reached a decision though. So if there is a good opportunity, there are about 3 entities that come to mind. Of course, we need to have the seller be eager to sell. And we haven't yet conducted any negotiations with the entities. But of course, we need to be prepared. Therefore, we procured JPY 70 billion. It's over par issue and the up rate is 25, and [ 29 13 ] is the conversion price. For the previous issuances, under the 130% call option clause, up until the month of -- end of September, we will be doing an early redemption. They should be converted into stocks. There are no people who would like to make losses, so they will basically convert and about half has already been converted.

For digital transformation, social changes such as the advancement of digital transformation provides a tailwind for the group, which has developed its business primarily through the online channels. It was a tailwind for the June quarter, and we believe it's going to be a stronger tailwind in the future. So COVID-19 has reshaped the preferences of consumers and investors from real to online. That's what we think. So for SBI SECURITIES, amid such circumstances due to voluntary stay-at-home restraints, people will go online instead, and they receive subsidies from the government. And maybe they had no intention of spending it. So together with their families of subsidies, they may have decided to make investments with the money they received.

So with regards to accounts, the increase we saw at SBI SECURITIES and Neo-Moba on an aggregated basis for the March quarter. Compared to first quarter 2019, the number of accounts went up by 2.27x. For Q1 this fiscal year, it went up by 2.15x. So we believe the number of new account openings sharply increased as a result of the increased demand for asset formation needs. And we have already surpassed Nomura, which I have been explaining from before. Combining our 2 businesses, we are currently at 5.7 million accounts. Even -- we don't even have to add the 2 businesses together, we still surpass Nomura.

Every year I show the CAGR, but it has been at 10.4%. On the other end, Nomura CAGR is at 1.6%. The gap between the 2 companies is widening more and more. I think this will have a great significance in the future. Also, with regards to SBI SECURITIES share of individual stock trading, for Q1 this fiscal year and the June quarter, our share was 40.3%. Livestar had a share of 3%. So we increased our share from 35.3% to 40.3%, it went up by 5% even more. If you look at the margin trading value share, it was originally 35.4%, which went up to 41.6%, and livestar accounted for 3.7% in the share. In other words, our margin trading value share is now at 45%. It includes all real physical brokers as well.

For banks, with regards to what's happening, I mentioned this earlier. But on an IFRS basis, we were able to increase equity method earnings -- equity and earnings by 1.9%. With regards to accounts, we will continue to see steady growth. And as of July 28, accounts were at 4.12 million. And for deposits, we were at JPY 5.7859 trillion. So as at the end of June, it was at JPY 5.6628 trillion. So just in 1 month, it went up to JPY 5.7859 trillion. So steadily, we are seeing the shift to the online banks.

And for mortgage loans, we are not seeing a decline. We are continuing to see a steady rise. Cumulative total of housing loans has exceeded JPY 6 trillion, also for the insurance business as well. This is on a preliminary basis. And for accurate numbers, it is expected to be released on August 7. However, ordinary revenue, has went up substantially. And profit attributable to the parent of the company has increased substantially as well. This is quite interesting. When you look at SBI Insurance, due to the stay-at-home requests, the number of motor vehicle accident reports declined by more than 20%. Therefore, the net loss ratio improved by approximately 20 points, which is quite big. As for SBI Life Insurance, keywords such as death and the number of cases as well as hospitalization as well as the medical collapse, these types of words have been reported through the media, on and on, which led to a higher sales of life insurance products. That happened until the month of May. Number of applications for death insurance increased by 2x or went up by 3.8x at times.

So for SBI SAVINGS BANK in Korea, the mobile channel is being leveraged by ourselves in Korea too in doing business with our customers. And as a result, that proved to be successful, as you can see here. So initially, for SBI SAVINGS BANK, they didn't have any technology whatsoever from my point of view, that is. But we acquired it in 2013, and they changed drastically to date. They implemented AI to increase their screening capabilities, and they enriched their mobile functionalities. So they are basically at par with mobile banks in Korea. And JPY 10.21 trillion, they surpassed that from a total asset point of view. And delinquency rates in total is at 1.7%. When we buy -- bought them back in 2013, delinquency rates were 51.6%. And people were wondering why we acquired this entity. And these stupid magazines were badmouthing us and lying about what really happened, but what happened over the years?

So in my year, I constantly think about what's going to happen in 1 year, 2 year or 3 years. It's a function of management. And what areas should we change in order to make that company better? That's what we think about. So management was not really happening. It was reckless management. And they were doing a lot of lending to property companies and so forth. But because they get so much of that, they weren't successful. Under the banking system, they should acquire normal deposits and do normal lending. Then they should be able to generate a margin. Don't you think so?

You don't want to inconvenience people who deposit their money with you. And no laws will be made that inconvenience the customers. So if we turn the entity into a decent entity, we'll be able to make it profitable. And if we borrow the power of technology, it can become even more better. It's a matter of how you can attract more customers and what kind of products you can develop in order to do that. So it was a buildup of these efforts that led to this performance.

So this is for January-June. So that is their half year from their fiscal year, and they were able to see net income grow by 22.7%. Broadly speaking, they were able to make JPY 13 billion. They were able to make this much profit, which is KRW 25 billion. So there is higher increasing needs for advanced asset management. So as I say, raised this issue about postretirement amount funding needed for JPY 20 million, this was a starting point of this national debate. So people began to take this as a personal issue. And this has actually applied to the younger generations as well. We saw the shift from savings to asset formation, even among the young generations.

And I believe that this trend has accelerated because of COVID-19. People are staying home, and there's less income and people are more concerned. And if you're not coming in to work anymore, you need to -- you don't have to pay for the train cost as well, the transportation cost. All you need to do is just pay once you come in to the company. And eventually, you are no longer needed, maybe AI can take over your job. Maybe we can just implement more RPA. So that's the direction.

Offices as well. We don't longer need the space. 1/3 can be let go because it's all remote work. But this sort of decision for early stage, I was wondering, I have a question of management who would make that kind of decision early on because there's no assessment of productivity. Is remote work really productive? Does that increase productivity? You really have to take a look at it for a certain period of time. A time span is needed in order to observe and analyze that. And maybe, there's ingenuity. Maybe, it leads to a new business generation. But you need to assess over a long period of time before you can make that decision.

And also, the cyberattack, we have to be aware of that. Can we say that remote work is really safe against cyberattacks? Maybe, it's vulnerable, what happens if you get attacked on a security basis? So you have to think about that, validate that. And you have to observe that for a certain period of time before you make the decision to go completely remote. So you don't want to panic and switch right away.

I was reading a journal in the United States. And I found that people are starting to really look at how they work even in the United States. Of course, that's natural. Management, managers, the mandate is to increase productivity, generate new products and services. And that's how they make money and in asset formation, people are beginning to see the importance of NISA and iDeCo. iDeCo is the individual-type defined contribution pension plan. So we're seeing increasing investments in these products. Even if you look at in terms of NISA trend, we have exceeded Nomura. With junior NISA, our market share is more than 30%. Number of new customers opening these accounts is 67.8%, among which 69.4% are beginner investors. So in other words, 47% are complete amateurs have now buying these products.

And you have iDeCo. On May 19, 2017, we completely made administrative fees for iDeCo completely free of charge. And at the end of June, we have nearly 366,000 iDeCo accounts, approximately 3x larger than end of May 2017. So SBI Benefit System is the one that's running iDeCo, but you can see that CAGR between 2015 March to June 2020 is 50.8%. That's an enormous growth industry. Or if you look at on the right-hand side for SBI SECURITIES, they're doing 401(k) individual-type distributed, the CAGR was 46.7%. So growing above 40% is a demonstration of a growth industry. So this is where we really need to work on. So we need to increase the number of new customers for iDeCo, and we actually became a cumulative industry leader in October 2018, we exceeded Tokio Marine.

And you can see that investment trust balance is jumping up. It's increasing rapidly. First quarter, you can see a huge increase. Commissioner Endo was saying this earlier, but some of the larger brokers are buying and selling, buying and selling overseas investment trust and making money from the commission. And that's a big problem. We don't do that. We manage it for the customers for their best benefit. They would choose it from Morningstar, and they want -- we want them, the customers, to hold it for long term and make it useful for the asset formation. That's the spirit which we work under. And those brokers who are basically generating money from this commission of sales and purchases, they will probably not survive in this industry. And with regards to wealth advisers, you can see that number of companies served is 444. So in other words, most of the financial institutions have implemented it. Number of units provided is 92,217. We have the fiduciary duty. So we have the responsibility to explain, and that's the responsibility of the bank counters. But that's what we do. We show and explain. Otherwise, the customers will never trust you.

And then we see the heightening needs of asset management by regional financial institutions. Now regional banks have serious issues. They would say that nearly 40% of the JGBs and municipal bonds will be maturing next 3 years, and they cannot increase their core net business income by simply just buying the issued bonds. Who is buying JGBs? Up until now, financial institutions have been central in purchasing JGBs. So there was not much to fear. If they don't purchase it, then someone else will buy it. But perhaps, in the future, JGB may plummet. But if there's no yield, and no one's buying it, then you have to buy it and then you enter in this vicious cycle. So Japanese fiscal status is really at a delicate point.

So in this situation, we are improving all of our portfolios, replacing it. We're -- and currently helping the customers to replace the portfolios. So for example, Shimane Bank -- among the 4 capital and business partners, Shimane Bank has entrusted JPY 64.2 billion to us. And you can see that breakdown of the amount of assets under management, SBI Regional Revitalization is 32%. And Shimane now is really transforming themselves. They've changed completely. Even those with our capital stake in it, they're still in the progress of improvement. This is SBI Asset Management Group. So it could be all-inclusive bond investment management, and carried estimate is actually nonclear, but it's all about JPY 2 trillion.

Now with regards to bio-related businesses, so concentration in selection and cost reduction. So Kamada Pharma, we have sold last year, but even everything else, we're implementing major reductions in cost. Quark, we decided that we will focus our resources on AKI clinical trial. It's not that all the others have gone bad, but we have decided that we increase the clinical trials. And they said that it's going to be more money. So then we said, you don't have to do it anymore. So we have just decided to just focus. So you will see the significant reductions in losses of the bio business.

As for AKI, we're expecting to complete the trial by June 18. So we don't need to recruit patients anymore. But because of COVID-19, we actually needed to do a blood sampling after 90 days, but there were few patients who were not able to come and get the blood testing. So there's a slight delay. But I think it's progressing well, the clinical trials are.

With regard to SBI Biotech, this is again advancing steadily. All the pipelines have been licensed out. And you can see the progress, for example, Phase Ib, the intention to do Phase II is done. And Kirin was doing preclinical, but it's progressing well. And in July, they have reached a milestone. So based on the milestone agreement, a lump sum payment will be made in Asahi Kasei as well, this is an exclusive license agreement, which we have concluded. Again, preclinical is progressing nicely. And Carna Bioscience, CDC Bio7, post-2022, they will start Phase I clinical trial. And they will be done in FDA -- I'm sorry, will be done in the United States. So they have just submitted IND to FDA.

As for ALA, cisplatin nephropathy protection, the conclusion of Phase II is underway. We have completed basically everything. So the primary endpoints have been achieved, and secondary, we believe can be achieved as well. So that's the situation. So we are now going to license this out. And once it's licensed out, they will decide whether they go to Phase III or maybe they will do Phase IIb. They will make that decision. And cisplatin is a widely used anticancer drug. And what are the problem is that it's very effective, but all the patents have expired, and there's a lot of generics available as well. It works but if you continue, there's a side effect of nephropathy, so -- or renal disorder. So if you drink -- take ALA together, then maybe you'll be able to keep down the adverse effects. So that's what we're testing on, and I think it's going well.

Mitochondrial diseases, Phase III has -- is scheduled to complete in April 2021. Mitochondria is again, a genetic disease, and it's -- and if you're missing this gene, then it's not a normal situation. So you will use ALA to supplement that in your body. And we believe that this will be effective for mitochondrial diseases. So we're implementing Phase III today. And if it goes well, number of patients is limited, but it's not -- but it will be a worldwide discovery.

And with regards to cardiac ischemia-reperfusion injury, it's been done at Oxford, Birmingham, Cambridge in the U.K. And then for iPDT, this is for solid brain tumors, very large ones, which cannot be taken out by surgery. So you drill a hole in it and you emit a light on it, and we have seen a result from the task that it worked well, that tumors disappeared, and there are -- some several cases that demonstrate that. So we are implementing that in Germany. And also breast tumor as well, we will be using PDD, and we are preparing for Phase III today. I believe that breast cancer is Canada.

So next is measures to increase the customer base and strengthen the profitability during and after COVID-19 era. So we have post-corona era in mind. When -- even if when we break out of this situation, we can anticipate a new trend, a new future. And we are developing new strategies, organizational strategies which we're implementing. In the era of with corona, which I've already seen, there's a certain direction we can assume. And so we are implementing new measures one after another.

So what is the new trend that we're seeing? And what is the measures we're implementing? This is everything we have really been saying from before. Because of the situation, we believe that we need to accelerate our initiatives for Neo-securities, in other words, from brick-and-mortar to online. That shift is accelerating. So we need to incorporate all of that. So our Neo-securities initiatives will be accelerated. And by the way, the definition of Neo-securities, it is endeavoring to eliminate trading fees for domestic stock transactions and some other fees that are currently incurred by investors. This is the definition of Neo-securities initiative by SBI.

So the challenge is, how do we decrease the dependency on equity sales commissions? In 2003, the commissions was 71%. That's a dependency. And now we have been decreasing this to 32% currently. But this includes nononline transactions as well. But if you just focus on online domestic stock trading commissions, then it's today 21.4%, especially when the market is active like today. And in July, perhaps we see a slight moderation, but I think it's a matter of time before we can continue to decrease this hopefully, down to about 5% or so because we are, for example, doing M&A and implementing different measures to do this.

Neo mobile will be much quicker than our target year. And the one that we had just acquired, this is just margin trading only. So basically, they have hardly any commissions. And in the second stage, we want to make all the commissions free of charge. And we will -- especially in Neo mobile, no charges, we will implement this as quickly as possible. And first step will be done even faster. And in order to do that, we need to really accelerate, push our M&A strategy. And we start with ones that have smaller impact on profitability. And we will do this one by one. And current initiatives to actualize a Neo-securities initiative, so we have done underwriting for primary and secondary market issuance, M&A activities. We are doing wholesale businesses. We're expanding brokerage services to customer financial institutions. And we're receiving commissions for that. But for along with promotional Niseko products, we will grow the noncommissions business such as investment trust fees, mutual funds by accumulating the invest in trust balances.

ForEx and crypto asset exchange businesses, this will help us increase trading income. Increase the number of co-managed shops of SBI MONEY PLAZA and regional financial institutions in order to also increase our face-to-face transaction needs. We will aggressively advance the, obviously, M&A activities for businesses that will decrease dependence on online brokerage commissions. So wholesale business is growing steadily. Our participation share remains to be #1 in the industry, so nonpublic underwriting, business bonds underwriting, this is increasing.

And through our Financial Institution department, we have been able to increase our brokerage business. We're increasing our structured products business, investment trust. If you say in Q1 March 2020 as 1.0 as ratio, then 2020 will be 1.8x. Investment trust if we expect to increase to 16.9 by March Q1 2021.

This shows the core managed shops with MONEY PLAZA. And there are increasing number of companies who would like to open, co-manage the stores and in which 12 banks and 15 shops are being operated. Shimizu, CHIKUHO, 2 stores are operated, and a third one is being aimed at. We are dispatching people to these shops as well. So in that sense, although we are approached by many players, but we are not able to respond to them. We needed to conduct the trainings. So we have to prepare well. And there are increasing number of regional banks having the deposit assets and increased by about 60x as compared to October 2017. And the number of accounts to co-manage the shops, 57.6x or 48.8x have been achieved in terms of increased ratio of the number of accounts at co-managed shops. And based upon such track records, increasing the number of banks who would like to cooperate with us now.

What kind of customers are becoming our customers? Corporations or business proprietors, company owners, executives. These 2 groups account for more than half, and customer deposit assets comprising of equity and denominated bonds, structured bonds. These 3 groups account for 70% or even 80%.

M&A as I have been telling you, FX company, crypto asset company, M&A specialist and asset management company. These are the target areas of M&A. We are asking for and looking for targets and M&A brokers as well are approached by us. And there are lots of approaches. We needed to be very selective. Fortunately, given this corona -- COVID-19 pandemic, the value of assets is deteriorating. And also with this drop of the performance, we can negotiate for good deal. But when it comes to acquisition, which is always difficult. Why am I saying it is difficult? Post-merger integration process, which is entailed.

After acquisition, the process of integrating different company, corporate cultures and people and the cultures and people were very different. And they are accustomed to different types of cultures. How can we integrate them as a one company. That is the key. If you are not succeeding, being in this. And then numerically, the negative goodwill would be welcome a lot. However, you want to see the real effect. From that integration, how can we realize the synergetic effect, together with the existing business of our group and newly acquired business, how can we generate and create synergies out of the 2 businesses. That is the most important point. And Kitao-san, you are doing a lot of M&As, and you are paying a lot of -- so I will do M&A as well. And they are paying a lot of money, exorbitant money, and they fail.

So there are many such cases. I have while I was at the [indiscernible], I was engaged in a lot of M&As. I have experience in the M&A activities a lot. And I know that from that experience, how difficult M&A is. And actually, opportunity for M&A is very rare. The matching of the sellers and potential buyers will be very rare. And increasing investments in promising ventures such as online health care, which is expected to grow post-COVID-19 era, the innovative start-ups are being generated, particularly during recessions. And those people who used to work for big corporations are fired, sacked and then join start-ups or starting their own start-up businesses. So increasing number of people come out of such recessions.

So during recessions, new innovative ideas will be generated. So we have to have a good understanding of that in conducting investment into ventures. SBI Investment is preparing a new fund, a Common Name 4+5 Fund, up to JPY 100 billion to accelerate investments into gross industries. And the digital fund is included as well. And as the asset management established SBI Post-Corona Fund. Well, this name is self-explanatory, what it does. This has been established by SBI Asset Management. And next one is crypto-assets, which will gain a lot of attention in the post-corona era. And also the unlisted equities will be included in the new asset classes for newly created funds based upon the anonymous partnership, and we will start from summer -- around the summer of 2020. And the unlisted equity included fund.

I used to do similar fund and it's 118.2% cumulative return. And then -- so this used to be in March 2006 and 95.2% in October 2005, according to the past record of the performance, which seems to be very excellent performance. And why did we discontinue these funds. If these are so successful, then you should continue this. We wanted to expand it to include the listed equities in Japan and Asia. I wanted to include those names -- excellent names to create new fund and partners were selected. And Pictet was named. Pictet, which is very -- the name, which I am very fond of in Switzerland, founded in 1805 and specializing in wealth management and investment services for the wealthy class private bank business. So it is rare for them to partner with a company embarking on such venture fund, but we had a good terms with Pictet and there was a negotiation ongoing and then Pictet, together with them, focusing on high tech companies, including the listed companies in Asia and 15% at maximum investment will be made in unlisted Japanese and Asian equities. So Pictet would provide a sense of assurance, and I will be able to be confident in running and recommending this fund. I think that this fund will be excellent.

We needed to create something which will make money. Otherwise, we won't be received well by customers. I would like to continue my concept of customer-centric. We wanted to create fund which will make money for customers. We never consider how much commission can be charged to make money. As digital transformation is expected to accelerate, with that use of digital assets in the international financial system expected to rapidly progress, the group will accelerate the establishment of businesses and organizing structure that will support the process. I know that the digital will expand at a very rapid pace. I have published a book centering on the cryptocurrency.

Some of you may have read this, central bank digital currency. The digital currency topics are also covered. China is going to issue Central Bank's currency. It's just a matter of timing. That is how I described. Once they issue their currency and then Japan or the U.S. and other advanced economies have to follow suit. The aim of China is how to deprive the U.S. of the status of the key currency of dollar. So how important the key currency status is? And you can just press and print the data and then you can get the money from all over the world. You can just issue paper notes to create money. Unfortunately, Japan does not have any key currency. We cannot become -- obtain that status. China, by issuing digital currency, now aims at decreasing the presence of dollar, and the trading partners of China will be utilized in terms of the use of digital currency issued by China. If Central Banks continue to issue and use such digital currencies, what will happen to the world? That's why I am putting so much effort on this area. STO, now which is regulated under the FIEL and like ICO, these will be -- ICO fraud will be eliminated, and a new types of financial instruments will be created by this. And this will lead to the creation of the new primary and secondary markets.

In this world of digital asset, in order to be a pioneer in the world, SBI Digital Asset Holdings has been established with offices in Japan and Singapore to develop global activities. The global investment activities are now being deployed. If you look all over the world, such a comprehensive and strategically and meticulously preparation is being made by any other companies like -- than us. So that's why many people are approaching us from all over the world. R3, Ripple, many people have not recognized how valuable they are. At such time, I thought that these will become a global standard. And I have continued to maintain that. And with both of them, we have established joint ventures in Japan. And in Ripple, in the remittance area, which is the leader, and it has become almost a global standard, R3 as well, over 300 top-notch financial institutions have become the members of this. Even central banks have become members. Security token offering, STO Association, it's the voluntary regulation organization.

I have organized this, and this organization is led by myself. I don't like to be such a leader of such association. But there is no choice, but to do this. As of August 1, we'll recommend another regular member and 11 supporting members, and there were 11 regular members and 34 supporting members in total. 45 companies will become the members of this association, and STO offering will be started. Of course, not merely offering, just preparing the primary market would not sustainable. So we have to create a secondary market as well, utilizing the PDS.

And we have been discussing this initiative at the association. New security token will be created. And equity, real estate and bonds, these real-world assets will be tokenized and bought on the blockchain as security tokens. We believe that this will lead to the creation of new world. Nomura Securities together with NRI has established the BOOSTRY. It's the U.S. securitization technology-based company. Well, we have decided to invest -- to take 10% of that alliance. And the large players collaborate for this will lead and which we do lead to the social benefits, public benefits, rather than having a fierce competition among key players. In such situation, I don't think that such collaboration will lead to public goods.

Further ahead, we are envisioning the global ecosystem for the first time in the world, in Stuttgart in Germany, Börse Stuttgart Exchange into which we made investment. And digital clearance -- clearing function into which we have decided to invest. And in Singapore, as I said earlier, in various formats, we are going to enter the market in various businesses. The era of Hong Kong is over now. I will touch upon this later in Japan and Singapore, which I expect to be the leaders in Asia, business America. Wherever there are good technologies, we have made investments and securitized as well. We have invested as well and Templum as well, which is also our investee.

Now supply chain management. Given this corona, COVID-19 pandemic, one of the big topics we have heard is the discontinuation of the supply chain. Supply chain has broken up and reliant on the raw materials or semi-finished goods produced in China. Such era is over. We need to diversify the sources of the supply, inclusive of the manufacturing site in Japan. Manufacturing system has to be revisited when situation turns out as such and then how can we maintain transparency of the supply chain. How can we maintain the safety and reliability of the chain. These will become very important. Then the DLT, distributed ledger technology, is the only solution. Therefore, in order to address those solution -- problems, supply chain management will be addressed by blockchain. And the best one so far is Corda from R3 in the U.S. for production processing, warehousing, foreign trade and local distribution, this entire process can be traced. So traceability-as-a-service can ensure safety as well as its genuinity.

Sometimes, it might be eel that's produced in China, but some people may lie that it was locally produced. But if you do this and apply the technology, this will not happen. I would like to visit the various companies and approaching them with this kind of technology. And Mr. Takamura as well as others will visit the financial institutions. And if they come to Tokyo, I will have dinner with them. And for our investees, I will leave it to Mr. Morita to manage them, but I will do my best, so that we can strengthen our corporate company division. When we strengthen our wholesale business, we started off from IPOs, but this is insufficient. I will do diplomacy with large corporates, and I have started to break through. And I have started visiting these companies already. And when I say I'm going to visit, not many companies decline. So I have been able to meet Presidents as well as the key person in charge. And what is very important at manufacturers as well as at distributors is supply chain management.

For remittance and payment sectors, expanding the utilization of digital assets, there are 36 companies that have already invested into MoneyTap, including large financial institutions. And there are other financial institutions that have raised their hands. And by using Israel's open legacy API integration service, the FinTech incubation platform and the bank can be easily connected. Shimane Bank, they were able to do it in 6 minutes, in fact. And also for peer-to-peer remittance between individuals, not only that, going forward, prepaid charge providers will be involved into our payment by applying MoneyTap, and we would like to develop a P2B business.

For online banks, we already have been connecting SBI Sumishin Net Bank, [ Circa Bank ] and Haemobank. And negotiations are underway to connect another 20 financial institutions that have invested into MoneyTap, of which 2 have already committed. We believe this number will continue to increase. It doesn't have to go through covers and costs can go down substantially. So there are various benefits for each entity. It's all good for all 3 parties, for the banks that are doing the prepaid charging as well as for the users, it's a benefit as well. So you could see here that it's great for all parties.

We've started being compatible with PayPay from January 31, 2020, as well as LINE Pay from March 31, 2020. It's not only that. If other banks want to connect with us, we are open to their approach as long as they go through our MoneyTap services. The number of amount of charges through MoneyTap is steadily increasing. This is just with 3 banks and Haemo just joined. So once the number of banks go up to 20, it's going to be far higher. It's hard to imagine.

Furthermore, for digital currency issuances, at Odaiba, at the UC Card office, we've been doing demonstrations of the UC Odaiba coin. And then Niseko in Hokkaido, we've been doing demonstration experiments for Niseko Pay. And we've also done TOKOWAKA Coin by CHIKUHO Bank,. This was all based off Orb technology. However, we are going to change it to Corda. So we will continue to do this based off Corda.

Example first shows supporting the distribution of premium electronic regional coupons at Ukiha

City Society of Commerce and Industry in Fukuoka prefecture, I think this kind of initiative is going to spread in the future by using Corda. It's going to be white label and will be hidden in the back. And that is fine with us.

So the fourth example, so Kyushu Electric Power company has been supporting this initiative, teaming up with the City Society of Commerce. So we started PLC testing on S coins issued for settlements using an S coin platform built with Corda. MoneyTap, Corda, S Coin, you could see that we are partnering together. This is the development we are seeing. The backbone technology behind MoneyTap is from Ripple. So by connecting that with R3's Corda. This is something I have continued to say that we should do. First, we had a fight, and there was a litigation, and then we settled the matter and then when both come together and become integrated, they can become a global standard. And it could nurture the biggest market in the financial industry.

So we are the leading shareholder in each entity. And this is my great -- one of my greatest wishes. So indirectly, we are currently working on this. I wouldn't say both companies are fighting still, but still, the relationship is somewhat challenging. Ripple is going to develop their payment mechanism. And Corda is going to create the remittance mechanism. If that happens, they need to -- they will need to compete against one another. Instead of competing if they partner together, they will be able to win. But unfortunately, it's not happening yet. At some point in time, I could be the middleman. And hopefully, we'll be able to bring both parties together.

So the fifth topic is one of the areas I'm putting a lot of effort into, which is bringing an international financial center to Japan. In the 1980s in Japan, it was when we prospered in Japan. And people talked about turning Japan into an international global financial center. However, it hasn't happened yet. Our governor talked about Tokyo and transforming it into international financial center, but no one really supported the initiative. And now COVID-19 occurred. And with COVID-19, and people are talking about the demerit of centralization, but it's better to be diversified, regionally distributed. One more thing that's being said, other than that is Hong Kong. It was renowned to be one of Asia's international financial center. However, China has started to say that they're going to quit the One Country Two Systems model. And China is now probably confident that they don't need Hong Kong, that they could do it in Shanghai. However, they also have the trade conflict between -- the trade war between the U.S. and China.

I'm sure it won't develop it into a real war, but the relationship is not that great. It is a cold war. And the European countries will probably be a part of it. It's a war of hegemony from the U.S's. point of view. So whether Biden wins or Trump wins, it doesn't matter, they'll probably continue to have same sense. China has caught up from a technological point of view. One is by stealing the technology, the other is they have been sending a lot of exchange students to the U.S. to study at universities and start to work at American companies, and they have been capable, become more capable. Obama didn't do anything about the situation. And in the telecommunications, 5G area, China centered around Huawei, continued to penetrate this space. So when it comes to Huawei, they were saying that they would like to consign some money to us through CDC, that they would like to invest into start-ups in Japan. We actually declined that offer. When you think about the circumstances surrounding the U.S. as well as in the Japanese government, we had no option but to decline.

So that is where we are. Going forward, Huawei's products are probably going to be completely shut out. And for 5G, there's a high health risk. There is a high possibility that brain tumors may develop. So when it comes to 5G, I am not really in agreement. I think we should swiftly transition to 6G. So there's a lot of problems associated with 5G, 4G is even dangerous. So when it comes to mobile phones, you need to have a filter that fends off electromagnetic waves even at home. I'm sure if you are well versed, you already have those types of gadgets in place. But these are the conditions you need to become an international financial center. You need to have a business environment with a visa and tax advantage. Japan definitely needs to have this in place. Human resource is #2. So visas are associated with that, the state of infrastructure, IT systems. Maybe, Japan can manage to have this in place. The final sector, maturity or development. This is probably fine too.

Maybe, when it comes to investment management, they're a little weak. International recognition, this probably can be achieved even if it's afterwards. But if centralization is not going to work, if it shouldn't be Tokyo. I think that it should be in Osaka or Hyogo, in areas that are -- have the initiative between -- together with a smart city initiative. The LDP, Satsuki Katayama, she has been taking initiative on this concept. And at the LDP, the financial lawmakers are the people I have been talking to. And at the beginning of August, I have -- I will meet the Governor of Osaka. So we can use one of the islands, a port island and build a smart city. And in the smart city, as part of regional revitalization, we could create initiative. In order to do regional revitalization, I think we should have and construct about 5 core cities across Japan. For Osaka and Hyogo, this is where the first rice futures trade happened, which was first in the world in Dojima. We could incorporate the entity in exchange and by leveraging the entity, we could also utilize TPP and a wide range of crops as well as presumably weather derivative products can be handled, where derivatives can be turned into financial products and maybe those products can be listed onto the exchange. That is what I am conceptualizing. The Vietnam's Head of the Agriculture Association is saying that he will support me on this front.

For e-sports, we would like to strengthen our contact with the digital generation. I think this is going to expand. So for the e-sports business, I appointed a young person to become the President. Presumably, the person is in his or her 20s, but it doesn't matter as long as they are motivated and as long as they are well-versed in this area. The person may not be seasoned yet. As long as they don't have any flaws, they can become seasoned in the future. These are the type of people I would like to appoint.

For the open alliance strategy, with regional financial institutions, we have been partnering with them. And it's part of the open alliance strategy. So short term, medium term, long term, regional financial institutions face a variety of challenges. Corporate value has been declining more and more. So we would like to resolve this issue, and that's where we started. And in order to do this, and there is forms and shapes, we have been setting up companies. For example, for SBI Regional Revitalization Investment alone, it is a part of the SBI Regional Revitalization Asset Management company. And they are 2 businesses, examples that are shown on the slide that will be conducted at this entity. At Asakura-san's place, they will be running this kind of business together with Investment Management. So that not only regional financial institutions, but for the regional city itself can have a higher IT literacy. And for the entire regional city, the local financial institutions can have a higher investment management capability.

And so that international arbitrage business can be conducted. We have been setting up various financial institutions across the world, and we would like them to leverage these opportunities. For SBI Royal Securities, they generate high yields. This company is based in Cambodia and yields are from 8.5%. And of course, this is on a local currency monetary basis. For TP Bank, that yields are 9.5% on a dong-denominated basis. Even if you do FX hedging, the yield is still far higher than that in Japan. Also, for SBI LYHOUR BANK, on a dollar-denominated basis, the yields are 5% and above. And on a Japanese yen basis, yields are 2% plus.

SBI is investing into these entities, we are a large shareholder. So we are basically responsible in the worst case. But of course, we will do it at a degree where a worst-case scenario would not occur. And we will consider our risk balance as we provide these opportunities. I talked about the Sri Lanka government bond, where yields are surging. Currently, they are exceeding 30%. And from when we invested, it has been more than 40%. So to this end, global investment opportunities were something that some financial institutions were -- didn't have any expertise on, but we are offering our expertise as well as our wisdom so that they can make an investment going forward.

SBI Group's asset under management, including private equity, have already reached JPY 3 trillion. We would like to increase it to JPY 5 trillion within 2 years and JPY 10 trillion within 5 years. I'm sure this is possible. When we exceeded JPY 1 trillion, which was in 2018 June, we were saying we are going to reach JPY 3 trillion in 3 years. And we have already reached JPY 3 trillion. So increasing that to JPY 5 trillion will be easy than growing from JPY 1 trillion to JPY 3 trillion. Because we have a track record, and now we have a name value.

Solving the business succession issue for local companies is the next topic. We established an SBI Regional Business Succession Fund at JPY 10.9 billion. This is number one. And with number 2 and number 3, we would like to increase that to JPY 100 billion. Various types of expertise from start-ups will be applied. And we will make improvement so that the companies can be nurtured into one second list. And we will also match up companies as well so that technological advantages can be higher. And if we believe a company can expand their distribution, we will also match them up together. We made our first investment into TOKUSHIMA KYOWA, which operates dispensing pharmacies. And today, the acquisition of 2 dispensing pharmacies in Osaka and 1 in Chiba have been completed. This is something we'd like to continue to do.

And the largest rice wholesaler, which is in KOBE, has a partnership with us now too. But Dojima Exchange, which we would like to incorporate, is another initiative we're working on, but this is part of what we have been working on. This is succession issues at the rice wholesaler is what we would like to solve, because successors are on the decline. Although, this is the largest rice wholesaler. We would like to continue to make acquisitions so that they could develop into a larger entity.

So start-up company, TRANBI, in collaboration with them, we have been providing a wide range of business succession and M&A opportunities. And steady progress within various measures undertaken with the regional financial institutions with which there are capital business alliances for the 4th Megabank Concept. So far it's 4 banks, but we would like to increase it to 10 banks at most. Why is it 10 banks? As we engage in these efforts, a lot of human resources are necessary, and investment management expertise is required as well. And we need to offer it to the banks. So if we just continue to make the investments, all of the earnings will come to us. However, when we divide it up, the source of our earnings will start to decline. Of course, we will be able to get investment management commission. And we need to make up for that part in order to offset the investments we are making. This is not a charity business. So as a listed company, towards our shareholders, we need to be accountable. And we would like to ensure that our business profit can be generated through these opportunities. And we will like the public good to lead on to private good. And that is our philosophy. And I think the limit for this to happen is 10 banks. So once we reach 10 banks, even if they approach us and say, we want to join as well, that may be a little bit hard on us.

And of course, we can support each other. When we will be the regional revitalization partners, which is a new mechanism, that will be central in promoting collaboration. So this is what that is. Here's 5 companies, DBJ, Yamaguchi Financial Group, Shinsei Bank and Concordia, Yokohama Bank. So basically, this will be operating democratically. Actually, on 15th of July, all the representative for companies came here, we had discussions. And after that, the working level -- the work together. And hopefully, we will be able to sign the agreement paper and officially launch in August. SBI's investment and loan have already started quickly so that we don't miss out on any opportunities. So SBI Regional Bank Holdings will work with the regional revitalization partners. And they will leverage the tools that's available. So that they can invest in -- our investees can benefit from it. Of course, these are 2 separate companies. But what's generated from here is not free of charge. Of course, it will be paid in consideration.

Now Shimane Bank we have 34% stake. But as you can see -- from this, you can see that they have already achieved a V-shaped recovery. And you can see in core operating profit, that's JPY 151 million. So before our action, PBR in 2019 September end was 0.21. This became 0.35 in June 2020. Shimane Bank, it's both their own efforts and with alliance with SBI Group. Investors' expectations for this have really risen. And I think this tells everything. The story tells everything. So we want to work with the banks. And this has been appreciated by the investors, by the local customers, by the local governments, by the public entities, the corporate businesses. And as a result, that's the outcome.

Using regional financial institutions as intermediaries, SBI Group is working with local businesses to expand attendance management services to SMEs nationwide. Shimane Bank is taking initiative to do this. Shimane Bank has business with Japan HiSoft, and they've introduced us to them, and we have decided to work with them. So we develop solutions with the local businesses. And I think that's where the regional revitalization can really contribute.

As for Fukushima, we're seeing increasing number of joint stores, but I think the best way is to have us focused on -- basically entrust us to do all the asset management. Otherwise, they cannot realize a V-shaped recovery like Shimane Bank's. So they really need to clean up their balance sheet first, clean up their portfolio, make it healthy. And if necessary, we can inject as much capital as possible, so they don't need to be intimidated or fearful. And CHIKUHO is also very proactive. And they changed quite significantly, same with Shimizu Bank in various ways, they consult us, and they take the initiative to endeavor on new businesses, and we're seeing a very nice trend.

Now this is SBI Sumishin Net Bank. They're moving towards global IPO, and they are unbundling banking functions and advancing. It's now a Neo-bank initiative, so not Neo-securities but Neo-bank's initiatives to partner companies. I want this to be a global offering. So we're preparing for this IPO. It might become more like a foreign capital, but we have chosen Nomura as a lead manager. And here's the initiative, and you can see these different moves. You think you can say that this has moved towards to become a world top Neo-bank.

And in coronavirus, I think we can even accelerate our initiatives. If it wasn't for corona, we would have moved much quicker because some of these things we can't just talk over Zoom. But we have other initiatives similar to this. So for example, we have JAL NEOBANK. We're offering different services through this Hikari Tsushin Group they have approximately 1,000 customer base, 1,000 distributors and 1 million corporate customers. We've signed up with them, and we're creating and innovating new businesses for SMB customer base and rejuvenate the regional economy. And if it wasn't for COVID-19, this would have advanced much quickly. But unfortunately, this will probably take a little more time. Z Holdings, again, we're performing alliance with them and working on them with different initiatives.

Yahoo! is almost, I think, 100% remote. But that's -- because of that, it's difficult for us to advance our discussions, I say I will go and then they all come out, and they will meet with me, but it's not that speedy. And what makes it a little difficult is that a merger with LINE has not been fully approved by FTC. So we're still -- it's still pending.

NetMove, this is a company we have already acquired. They are doing well, riding on the waves of cashless trend. And strengthening relationship with business corporations from our alliance in various business fields. We can form an alliance with every single sort of company, any kind of company with any customer. And we can expand our customer base through this. Yesterday's enemy is today's friend. I don't want the vice versa either. We want them to be our friend forever. So that's the sort of alliance we want to form.

In that sense, in April, we have agreed on a strategic capital and business alliance with SMBC. Last time, I was not able to go into details, but I can say this time that these are the initiatives that we will work together. So for example, we can do inheritance-related services using SMBC's bank for SBI SECURITIES customers, or we can have collaboration utilizing credit card points. It's offering a credit card-based investment trust-accumulation service as a new asset management service for individual customers. Or we can offer new investment services by using the points earned on investment trust balances or we can have -- for example, there's a 20% investment by SBI Neo-Moba securities into SMBC's Neo-Moba. So we can raise usefulness by linking balances with MBC or we can implement seamless deposit withdrawal, including automatic fund transfers with MBC. So these are the things that we've done at the securities company. But we want to do this at this level with SMBC as well.

There's many other things that we have not announced yet, that's still underway. The card we just decided to go announce it because -- do we? I guess so. Every day, there's some sort of announcements, I have to make sure. So this is SMBC Mitsui Sumitomo Card. They have experience in handling various cashless payment brands like Visa, Mastercard and Apple Pay. So this and SMB Sumishin SB Net Bank will collaborate. And they can -- discussing on offering mobile payment service to the partner companies.

Escrit is a wedding company. It's a bridal service company. This is one way to think about it, but this is looking at the lifetime value, the long-term value of someone's life, and we want to offer these services throughout someone's life. Now Takashimaya department Store has many high-net worth customers. And we are building -- they're building a service that is actually face-to-face and online financial service, or we're purchasing a lot of SSI companies under the SBI Insurance Group, and we're leveraging this diversity of products, for example, motorcycle insurance or pet insurance. For example, the relationship readers, that's critical to expanding customer base. And we have CVC Fund, which started in 2016. It's JPY 64 billion today. We want this to grow to a cumulative JPY 100 billion. I think we can probably accelerate the pace. But that's the commitment amount that we're aiming for.

And just for reference, these are the for example, SBI securities, consolidated results, accounts, AUMs or ForEx, and accounts and customer deposit assets, showing you that we're overwhelmingly #1 in deposit asset management business. What's IPO, M&A, these are sort of things that we have always been announcing and disclosing from before. So all that information is in the reference materials, please look at it on your time. This is how many drug stores are handling ALA. And in May, we have completed the filing of a drug that we have been developing, the cholesterol and blood pressure reduction products. And in July, we launched a clinical trial on improving depression and mood. And in 2020, we're planning to file all these different treatments, for example, recovery from fatigue or increased metabolism while suppressing sugar absorption. We are working with Hiroshima University, male menopause improvement. This is a collaboration with Juntendo University, fatigue reductions after exercising again with Juntendo University. So one after another, we are being able to complete new foods, development using ALA, which has a functional claims. ALA has had all these different efficacies, and we can offer these products as a food with functional claims.

Now digital assets, we see trade, again plus 277.8. Cryptocurrency was 230 -- JPY 223.7 billion. So on an overall basis, digital asset-related business is all positive. Customer base, 28 million, you can see increasing year by year. CAGR is 8.51%. And number of employees is now 8,257. It's increasing. And a number of companies are also increasing. We have 308 altogether in the group company, including equity method. So in 20-some years, this is how far we've gotten. So that is all from me. We have some time left until 6 o'clock. So if you have a question, I'd like to take it from the floor.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]