Some in the industry are discussing the possibility that game companies, which are major shareholders, will use these exchanges for irreplaceable token (NFT) businesses around virtual asset exchanges “Coin One” and “Cobbit.”

This possibility started with the fact that Coinone and Covit’s major shareholders are all game companies such as Com2us and Nexon.

First of all, if you look at Coinone, game company Com2us has a 38.43% stake in Coinone. Com2us is the second-largest shareholder because CEO Cha Myung-hoon, the founder of Coinone, held 53.46%.

Com2us purchased a 16.47% stake at a cost of 40.5 billion won twice in April and June 2021. Later, in January, the following year, it purchased an additional 54 billion won and bought an additional 21.96%. Com2us even issued 60 billion won worth of convertible bonds (CBs) to raise the acquisition price when it was purchased in January.

Why did Com2us invest 94.5 billion won to gain the status of the second-largest shareholder who cannot even exercise management rights?

The industry believes that it is due to ‘new business based on virtual assets’. In fact, Com2us operates four types of P2E games, including ▲ Summoners War: Hundred Years’ War ▲ 2022, Bill Professional Baseball Superstars. In the future, they also planned to release 10 kinds of games as P2E.

In other words, the P2E game is a so-called “money-making game,” which allows Com2E to convert the game currency obtained in the game into CTX, a virtual asset issued by Com2E, and again sells CTX to a virtual asset exchange to earn cash.

The case of Corbit is not much different from the situation of Coinone.

Corbit is Nexon’s largest shareholder and SK Group’s second-largest shareholder, and both companies are carrying out virtual asset-related businesses or announced related business plans.

Nexon holds 48% and 16% respectively through NXC, a holding company, and Simple Capital Futures, a subsidiary specializing in investment, and holds 64% of shares in Covit. In the case of SK Group, SK Square, a company specializing in new business and investment, held a 35% stake, taking the second-largest shareholder position of Covit.

Nexon is showing a management form that focuses on the growth outlook of the virtual asset market and opens up the possibility of convergence with the game industry.

Nexon announced in June that it would launch a NET business using the IP of its flagship game “Maple Story.” This is Nexon’s first entry into a blockchain technology-related business, which aims to allow game users to freely trade items obtained during the game process by making them into NFTs.

In March, SK Square also announced its plan to issue its own virtual asset, SK Coin (tentative name) and list it on domestic and foreign exchanges. Although the issuance of coins has been temporarily suspended due to the worsening virtual asset industry, the industry expects SK Group to re-promote the issuance of coins.