JJapan Finance

Optimizing investing/holding points between Rakuten and SBI

  • January 31, 2026

Hi, I've been using Rakuten Securities for multiple years now, as I didn't see any downside to it in terms of UX/UI and general usability. Recently I got the Rakuten Gold card to get a slightly higher points return (0.75%) from the monthly investments of 150k (100k card + 50k rakuten cash).

I then stumbled on the first-year-free campaign from SBMC for their Gold NL card and got curious about points optimization in the SMBC/SBI ecosystem. It seems they offer much more attractive conditions than Rakuten:

  1. You get 1% instead of 0.75% points on monthly investments. It looks like the 1% might be only for the first year, but still only goes down to the same 0.75% from the second year.
  2. These monthly investments seem to be not capped, instead of 150k with Rakuten.
  3. You get points passively just for holding assets in SBI (0.1% or 0.2% on all your assets?).

Did I understand that correctly and SBI is much more attractive, especially for the last two points? Or am I missing something important?

If so, I am considering switching all my future tsumitate settings from Rakuten to SMBC/SBI. As for the transfer of existing assets like mutual funds, is it easy/free to do? I understand that NISA might not be transferable without liquidating, but what about a regular tokutei holdigs?

Any insights and comments will be very appreciated!

by Iekei_ramen

3 comments

  1. To earn points you need to do tsumitate in your NISA, that’s the only way you can use the credit card. The yearly tsumitate limit is 1200000 right? So 100k a month

  2. ポイ活 is a long and arduous path.

    As an example…. funds in SBI don’t get you 0.1% or 0.2%. Each fund has their own unique percentage.

    What you need is a spreadsheet.

    At the very least, I can confirm that last time I looked, the Rakuten point system was way worse than the SBI Point System.

  3. NL gold card is much better than Rakuten Gold. You can spend 1 million yen in a year, and it becomes free for life.

    Those passive rates in (3) only apply to some expensive funds. Decent funds yield far less.

    Rakuten offers bonuses once your balance hits a certain point, (at 20 million they give you 500 points, etc) https://www.rakuten-sec.co.jp/web/rfund/guide/long_term1.html?utm_source=chatgpt.com

    Also Rakuten funds have a better yield. https://www.rakuten-sec.co.jp/web/rfund/guide/zandaka_program/

    It is not a simple comparison.

    My Nisa is with Rakuten, and my taxable with SBI. Rakuten has better apps (I grow) and interface.

    SBI has more of everything (IPOs etc)

Comments are closed.