Immy Dorse 
Well, here’s something you don’t see every day. A major mobile gaming firm is making a pretty substantial bet on a specific cryptocurrency, and it’s not just Bitcoin they’re after.
Gumi, the Japanese company behind a number of popular mobile games, has decided to purchase a staggering 25 billion yen worth of XRP. That works out to roughly $170 million. The company’s board made the announcement earlier today, outlining a plan to acquire the digital asset over a six-month window starting in September of next year.
More Than Just a Price Bet
What’s interesting here is the reasoning. Gumi was careful to note that this isn’t purely a speculative play, a simple hope that the price will go up. They’re framing it as a strategic move. The goal, it seems, is to get a foothold in international payment systems and liquidity networks. They think holding XRP will open up new revenue streams tied to blockchain-based finance.
Perhaps that line of thinking isn’t too surprising when you consider their largest shareholder. SBI Holdings has been a major proponent of XRP for years, placing it at the center of its own global money transfer strategy. For Gumi, this purchase is apparently a “high strategic fit” with that existing vision. It’s a logical, if ambitious, alignment.
A Two-Part Crypto Strategy
This isn’t Gumi’s first foray into digital assets, either. They revealed they already bought about 10 billion yen in Bitcoin during the first part of 2025. That Bitcoin is being used in staking protocols, like Babylon. So they’re clearly building a two-part portfolio.
They’re positioning Bitcoin as that sort of universal, long-term holding—a global asset. XRP, on the other hand, is being treated differently. They see it as a “financial demand-driven network asset.” In simpler terms, they’re banking on its use in real-world financial infrastructure, like cross-border payments, growing significantly. They believe that real-world utility will drive its value over the medium to long term, not just trader speculation.
It’s a nuanced take. A lot of companies just buy Bitcoin and call it a day. Gumi is making a more complex argument for holding two very different cryptocurrencies for two distinct reasons.
Transparency and History
The company says it will value its crypto holdings every quarter and will keep the public informed, especially if those holdings start to materially impact their finances. That’s probably a smart move for shareholder transparency.
And in a interesting little footnote, it turns out Gumi and Ripple—the company closely associated with XRP—have a history. They both invested in a biometrics startup called Keyless back in 2019. So there’s a prior connection there, which maybe makes this latest news a little less out-of-the-blue.
It’s a bold strategy. Only time will tell if it pays off.
*This is not investment advice.