GMO-Z

GMO-Z.com Trust Company (GMO Trust) is the New York-regulated issuer of GYEN, marketed as the world's first regulated Japanese yen stablecoin, and ZUSD, a US dollar stablecoin. Both tokens run on Solana as well as Ethereum and Stellar. The company is closing down. It stopped minting new tokens in May 2026 and began a voluntary dissolution under New York law. Holders can swap their tokens for yen or dollars at full value until November 11, 2026. After that, tokens still on a supported blockchain are paid out automatically in USDC.

What happens to GYEN and ZUSD after November 11, 2026

GYEN and ZUSD left unredeemed at the deadline go through a "mandatory redemption", set out in a GMO Trust notice. GMO Trust sends Circle's USDC to the wallet holding the tokens, on the same blockchain, and then removes the GYEN or ZUSD from circulation.

• ZUSD is valued at 1 ZUSD = 1 US dollar.
• GYEN is valued at 1 GYEN = 1 yen, converted to dollars at one USD/JPY rate set on November 12, 2026. Every holder gets the same rate.
• USDC delivery is expected to finish by the end of 2026. GMO Trust will not announce the exact date in advance.

Some holders will not be paid this way:

• Wallets that fail anti-money-laundering or sanctions screening.
• Balances below the smallest USDC transfer the chain allows.
• Tokens bridged to a blockchain GMO Trust does not support.

Where USDC cannot be delivered, the amount is "retained and subsequently addressed in accordance with applicable law". A separate notice will explain how to claim it. Stellar holders need a USDC trustline in place or they cannot receive the payout.

GMO Trust says it will never ask holders to connect a wallet, sign a transaction or pay a fee to receive USDC. Treat any message that does as a scam.

How to redeem GYEN and ZUSD before the deadline

Direct redemption runs through the GMO Trust Platform. You need an approved account with identity checks (KYC). Holders without one can still apply, but only to redeem tokens they already hold. The steps, per the how-to-redeem notice:

1. Open or log in to an account at stablecoin.z.com and pass KYC.
2. Link a bank account: a yen account (Bank Wire JPY) for GYEN, a dollar account (Bank Wire USD) for ZUSD. A non-yen account can be registered as Bank Wire (JPY), but the receiving bank does the currency conversion and may reject the wire.
3. Submit the redemption request and send the tokens to GMO Trust as instructed.

GMO Trust charges no redemption fee. The minimums are 100 GYEN and 1 ZUSD. The tokens must arrive at GMO Trust before the deadline. A request submitted in time without the tokens is cancelled, and the tokens fall into the mandatory redemption. Platform access ends after the deadline, so download your transaction history first.

The alternative is selling on a secondary market, which does not guarantee par. GMO Trust lists Uniswap on Ethereum (GYEN/USDC and ZUSD/USDC), Uniswap on Arbitrum (GYEN/USDC) and the Stellar DEX. It lists no Solana venue. Account holders can use the platform's swap function to move tokens to a chain where liquidity exists.

Coinbase suspended GYEN trading in May 2025 and said it would convert remaining GYEN balances on its platform to USDC by October 30, 2026, Crypto Briefing reported.

GYEN and ZUSD on Solana

GMO Trust announced the Solana launch on January 23, 2024. Trading went live on February 14, 2024. CEO Ken Nakamura called it "an important milestone in our multi-chain development." Solana was its third chain, after Ethereum and Stellar. Account holders can still swap tokens between chains for free during the wind-down.

The official Solana mint addresses, from GMO Trust's supported blockchains page:

• GYEN: Crn4x1Y2HUKko7ox2EZMT6N2t2ZyH7eKtwkBGVnhEq1g
• ZUSD: FrBfWJ4qE5sCzKm3k3JaAtqZcXUh4LvJygDeketsrsH4

Solana is still a supported blockchain, so GYEN and ZUSD held at these mints qualify for the USDC mandatory redemption. Tokens with the same name or ticker at any other address are not GMO Trust's.

How GYEN and ZUSD worked

An account holder sent cash to GMO Trust and new tokens were minted. On redemption the tokens were burned and the cash paid back. Each GYEN was backed by one yen in reserve. ZUSD was backed by dollars in insured banks, money-market funds and Treasury bills. Outside accountants checked the reserves every month. GMO Trust made its money from interest on the reserves, so buying and swapping were free.

You needed a checked account to mint or redeem. Once issued, though, the tokens moved freely on-chain. GYEN was never offered to people living in Japan, because of Japanese rules. The tokens traded on Bitstamp, Uniswap and Curve, among others. Anchorage Digital, Copper, Fireblocks and BitGo supported custody.

Who GMO Trust is

GMO Trust was set up in December 2020. It is wholly owned by GMO Internet Group, a Tokyo-listed internet and finance group. New York's financial regulator, NYDFS, gave it a limited purpose trust charter. That put it under direct state supervision.

Official wind-down news comes only from GMO Trust's own channels. These are its stablecoin.z.com websites, the @GMOTrust X account, LinkedIn, Medium, and email from @gmo-trust.com.

GYEN depeg and the class action settlement

GYEN's price on secondary markets often strayed far from the yen. After its November 2021 Coinbase listing it traded with heavy volatility. Buyers sued in Donovan v. GMO-Z.com Trust Company in the Southern District of New York. They said GYEN, sold as a low-volatility coin backed 1:1 by yen, swung more than 200% against the dollar while the yen moved about 7%.

The court rejected GMO Trust's motion to dismiss in February 2025. The company agreed to a $6.75 million settlement, which won final approval on May 27, 2026, according to class counsel Berman Tabacco. Bloomberg Law reported that the class covers buyers in New York or California who bought GYEN while it was off its peg and lost money between December 29, 2020 and October 10, 2025.

Who GYEN and ZUSD are still for

The only people with a reason to deal with GMO Trust now are existing GYEN and ZUSD holders.

• Holders who can pass KYC and want par in fiat should redeem directly before November 11, 2026, allowing time for account approval and bank checks.
• Holders who can't or won't do KYC, including small Solana balances, should keep the tokens at the official mint in a wallet they control. They will get USDC through the mandatory redemption, provided the wallet passes screening and the amount is above the transfer minimum.
• Nobody should buy GYEN or ZUSD now. Minting has stopped, and secondary-market prices may sit well above or below par.

Risks of holding GYEN or ZUSD now

• Deadline risk. Direct redemption needs tokens to reach GMO Trust before 11:59 p.m. ET on November 11, 2026. Late transfers drop into the mandatory redemption.
• Payout in USDC, not fiat. Mandatory redemption pays Circle's USDC. For GYEN, the amount is fixed by a single November 12, 2026 exchange rate.
• Screening exclusions. Wallets that fail AML or sanctions checks, and dust balances, get no USDC. They are left to a claims process that GMO Trust has not yet published.
• Unsupported chains. Bridged or wrapped versions on chains GMO Trust does not support get nothing from the mandatory redemption.
• Thin secondary markets. GMO Trust lists no Solana liquidity. Selling elsewhere can mean heavy slippage and no par guarantee.
• Scams. GMO Trust warns it will never ask you to connect a wallet, sign a transaction or pay a fee for the payout.
• Depeg history. GYEN's market price has diverged sharply from the yen before, which led to the $6.75 million settlement above.

Alternatives to GYEN and ZUSD

USDC is the natural replacement for ZUSD. GMO Trust pays the mandatory redemption in USDC. The exit routes it lists on Uniswap and Stellar also trade against USDC.

GYEN has no direct successor from GMO Trust. If you want yen on-chain after the wind-down, check any replacement's issuer, regulator and redemption terms first. GYEN's own history shows that a "regulated" label does not keep the market price on its peg.