Kraken Lists LINK, OMG and BAT for Japanese Users

Available information has indicated that one of the world’s leading crypto exchanges, Kraken, has just added support for three new tokens, including Chainlink (LINK), Basic Attention Token (BAT), and OMG (OMG), for its Japanese customers.

Kraken’s 3 new Listings

In a January 12 blog post, the exchange disclosed that Kraken Japan now handles trades on the tokens mentioned above. 

All Kraken Japan clients can now trade $OMG, $BAT & $LINK 😱🦇🔗

🌏 In addition to 12 new currency pairs – including crypto trading in USD & Euro!

Learn more in our blog: https://t.co/p5tFPOnvEc pic.twitter.com/mDVNn6P1FE

— Kraken Exchange (@krakenfx) January 12, 2022

Per the announcement, the OMG Network (OMG) is an ERC20 standard-based token. OMG Network is one of the fast-rising Layout 2 solutions providing solutions to Ethereum scalability problems.

The network was rebranded from OmiseGo, and its main objective is to offer accessible, low cost and speedy peer-to-peer financial services for unbanked individuals. 

As of press time, the OMG token is one of the highest gainers in the market with its price rising by 14.3% in the last 24 hours to $5.88.

Basic Attention Token (BAT) is an ERC20 standard token that supports a decentralized, open-source advertising platform. It functions in a “Brave” web browser, which aims to exist alongside users, advertisers, and websites. Users of this browser earn BAT as rewards for viewing ads on websites. 

BAT token has risen by 7.5% in the last 24 hours and it is trading for $1.08 presently.

The third token, Chainlink (LINK), is also an Ethereum ERC20 token. 

According to Kraken,

LINK connects decentralized peer-to-peer networks and smart contracts to real-world data, events, and payments.

Amongst the three assets, LINK is the only one that has been on a green run within the past week, however, within the last 24 hours, it has lost 1.6% of these gains. It is currently trading for $26.3.

Kraken’s Operation in Japan

Kraken’s first foray into Japan began a month after the former leading exchange in the region, Mt. Gox exchange, suffered a major hack and went bankrupt due to a $460 million loss in 2014. At the time, Kraken founder Jesse Powell got an invitation to help recover the fund.

Kraken Japan eventually launched and started trading around 2014 to fill the vacuum left by the defunct Mt. Gox exchange. Four years later, it ceased operation due to “rising costs” and need to focus its resources.

But it relaunched operations in October 2020, with just a limited number of crypto assets available for its users. But since then, it has steadily increased the numbers of available digital assets.

Japan’s regulatory landscape is still working to develop a stricter regulatory framework. Authorities in the Asian country had set up a panel in August last year to help it strengthen its regulation. 

Just recently, the Financial Services Agency (FSA) revealed its intent to regulate stablecoins like USDT and co.