Meet the man who's making waves with advocacy for bitcoin in Japan

Tokyo

THE man who single-handedly made Japan an oasis for bitcoin entrepreneurs was holding court with political supporters. The price of admission: US$83.75. Squeezed into a tiny private room at a Chinese restaurant not far from Tokyo's capitol hill, Mineyuki Fukuda was at the head of the table with half a dozen techies.

Mr Fukuda started by explaining how he, a second-term lawmaker on an obscure sub-committee overseeing electronic payment systems, wound up in charge of Japan's bitcoin policy.