Guest Post: What a Bitkub unicorn means for Thailand’s startup ecosystem

It seems that hardly a month goes by without Siam Commercial Bank, one of Thailand’s oldest and largest financial institutions, making a gargantuan announcement that shakes the country’s tech and startup ecosystem to its core. Back in September, the bank announced a massive corporate restructuring and plans to raise a US$600–800 million DeFi venture fund. A few hours ago, news broke that the soon-to-be-christened SCBX would be acquiring a controlling 51% interest in Bitkub, Thailand’s largest digital asset exchange, for US$537 million, arguably minting Thailand’s first verifiable unicorn (while there are one or two other Thai tech companies claiming billion-dollar valuations, the Bitkub deal is the only one so far to disclose pricing and valuation information that confirms its unicorn status).