Nomura to tighten controls at Laser Digital after crypto losses hit quarterly profit
Nomura Holdings said it will tighten risk controls at its crypto unit Laser Digital after losses in the business helped drive a 9.7% drop in fiscal third-quarter profit, Bloomberg reported.
At an earnings briefing, Nomura CEO Hiroyuki Moriuchi said the firm has implemented stricter position management to cut risk exposure and limit the impact of crypto market swings on earnings. Nomura’s net income for the three months ended Dec. 31 fell to $590 million.
The move follows extreme volatility in October: on Oct. 10 — four days after bitcoin set a record above $126,200 — the market experienced a flash crash that wiped out more than $19 billion in leveraged positions, the largest deleveraging event in crypto history. Bitcoin finished the year at roughly $87,000, about 31% below its October peak, and total crypto market capitalization fell from about $4.3 trillion to just over $3 trillion by year-end, according to Coingecko.
“There is a vague sense of unease about the overall market direction, and that seems to have combined with the surprise on the crypto front to set off selling,” said Hideyasu Ban, a senior analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, adding the reaction is likely short-term.
Notably, just three days before Moriuchi’s announcement, Laser Digital’s Americas division filed a de novo application with the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to establish a national trust bank — joining several crypto firms pursuing bank charters to expand asset-management and custody services for digital assets. The filings underscore a dual strategy at play: scaling back risk exposure while building regulated infrastructure to serve the growing institutional crypto market.
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