In Japan’s largest IPO since 2018, Rakuten Bank completed its 89.5 billion JPY (US$666.7 million) initial public offering. The transaction, which values the Japanese digital bank at 238.0 billion JPY (US$1.7 billion), consisted of a registered global public offering in Japan and an international offering outside Japan in reliance on Rule 144A and Regulation S.
Rakuten Bank is the largest digital bank in Japan, with 13.3 million accounts and total deposits of 8.8 trillion JPY as of December 31, 2022. Rakuten Bank offers a range of deposit and lending products, including personal loans and business loans. The bank is a core entity within the Rakuten Ecosystem, Rakuten Group’s unique business model, which provides more than 70 services in a wide variety of areas and industries, including fintech, digital content, e-commerce and mobile phone services, to more than 100 million customers.
The S&C team advising Rakuten Bank as issuer and Rakuten Group as selling shareholder in the international offering included Keiji Hatano, Nirav Mehta and Shihui Xiang. Jeff Hochberg, Saul Brander and Devin Risinger advised on U.S. tax matters. Anna Erickson advised on ERISA matters. Kirsten Rodger and Siddhant Iyer advised on U.K. and EU law-related matters.