Shinhan and Visa Partner to Build Stablecoin Payment Infrastructure in South Korea

Shinhan Financial inks deal with Visa to build stablecoin payments and settlement rails South Korea’s Shinhan Financial Group has struck a strategic agreement with Visa to begin building stablecoin payment and settlement infrastructure — a move that expands Shinhan’s crypto experiments into more production-oriented pilots and brings Visa’s global payment capabilities into the mix. What the partnership covers - Initial focus: testing the full stablecoin lifecycle — issuance, transfer/remittance and redemption — using Visa’s existing stablecoin platform and technology. - Localisation: jointly designing a model that fits South Korea’s financial system and regulatory requirements, rather than leaving work confined to isolated blockchain proofs of concept. - Payments and settlement pilots: plans include integrating stablecoins into Shinhan’s payment services and card settlement pilots, plus exploring AI-powered payment models and new consumer and business services. - Participants: Shinhan will pull several core subsidiaries into the work, including Shinhan Bank, Shinhan Card and Jeju Bank; Visa contributes its international payment network and digital-payment tech. Shinhan Financial Group Chairman Jin Ok-dong framed the deal as an expansion of an existing relationship with Visa into “the broader digital finance sector.” The financial group reported net income of 1.82 trillion won (roughly $1.3 billion) for the latest quarter, underscoring its capacity to invest in this push. How this builds on Shinhan’s recent blockchain activity The Visa collaboration reinforces and scales up experiments Shinhan and its units have already been running: - In April, Shinhan Card partnered with the Solana Foundation to test stablecoin payments on Solana’s testnet, simulating merchant‑customer flows to evaluate throughput, security and non‑custodial wallet performance. That trial also explored a hybrid architecture connecting legacy payment rails with decentralized finance tools and used oracle feeds for smart contract triggers while maintaining monitoring and governance. - Shinhan joined eight other Korean banks in a government program testing tokenized bank deposits for public spending; South Korea’s Ministry of Economy and Finance plans to pilot the system in Sejong City in Q4 2026. - In August, Shinhan Asset Management signed an MoU with the Solana Foundation, Etherfuse and decentralized exchange Orca to trial a Korean won–denominated tokenized fund, signaling expansion beyond payments into tokenized investment products. Institutional rails and strategic partnerships Shinhan has also been engaging with institutional blockchain infrastructure: - In June, Shinhan Asset Management and Shinhan Investment & Securities each signed agreements with the Canton Foundation to study tokenized financial products, South Korean digital-asset rules, and ways to make Korean assets accessible to international investors via Canton Network. Canton is a public-permissioned blockchain aimed at regulated financial institutions, with tooling for tokenized assets, settlement and privacy/compliance controls. - Shinhan later added an investment dimension: in July the financial group and Standard Chartered’s SC Ventures joined a $365 million funding round for Digital Asset (the company behind Canton Network), with Shinhan contributing $10 million. - Visa has separately tested stablecoin settlement on Canton Network in a pilot with Brale’s SBC stablecoin, exploring private, compliant blockchain-based settlement for financial institutions. Regulatory backdrop: rules still in flux All this activity is occurring while South Korean policymakers continue to negotiate a legal framework for stablecoins and broader digital-asset activities. Key points under discussion: - The proposed Digital Asset Basic Act is expected to cover stablecoins, digital asset service providers, disclosure and internal control rules, and possibly cross-border stablecoin rules and amendments to allow spot crypto ETFs. - The Bank of Korea favors a bank-led approach for won‑pegged stablecoins, supporting consortium structures in which regulated financial institutions take the lead. It has proposed a statutory oversight body to coordinate regulators and agencies. - Industry and think-tank proposals (including a July report from Hashed Open Research and the Solana Policy Institute) have floated interim licensing guidance and hybrid ownership models where banks hold majority stakes while fintechs handle operations. - The Financial Services Commission is working on consolidating multiple pending digital-asset bills, potentially creating a unified government-backed framework in 2026. Central bank experiments Shinhan is also participating directly in central-bank tokenization tests. In the latest phase of the Bank for International Settlements’ Project Agora, Shinhan Bank — together with NongHyup Bank — participated in a domestic trial that transferred 20 million won in tokenized central-bank reserves. The Bank of Korea issued, transferred and redeemed the funds on the project’s platform. Why it matters The Shinhan–Visa partnership signals a shift from isolated blockchain proofs toward integrated payment and settlement pilots backed by established financial players and global payment infrastructure. If pilots succeed and regulatory frameworks align, Korea could see bank-led, compliant stablecoin rails that interoperate with both legacy payments and tokenized financial products. However, final design choices — issuer eligibility, reserve oversight, and regulatory authority — remain unresolved and will shape how quickly such initiatives scale. Expect more pilots and policy debate in Korea through 2026 as banks, payment networks and regulators try to define practical, compliant pathways for stablecoins and tokenized finance.