Bank of Korea reiterates support for bank-led issuance of won stablecoins, advancing pilot applications of deposit tokens

BlockBeats news, July 9: The Bank of Korea (BOK) submitted its latest opinion to the National Assembly's Finance Committee, reiterating that Korean won stablecoins should be issued primarily by a bank consortium, and suggesting the establishment of a statutory policy coordination mechanism involving relevant regulatory agencies to strengthen the stablecoin issuance and oversight framework. The BOK stated that this stance aims to safeguard financial stability and once again highlights its divergence from some political and industry bodies on the issue of stablecoin issuance entities.

At the same time, the BOK announced that it will continue to advance the deposit token pilot in the second half of this year, planning to apply it to government subsidy distribution, consumption vouchers, charging infrastructure payments, and more real-world business scenarios. Deposit tokens are the tokenized form of commercial bank deposits and are seen as an important direction for Korea's push toward tokenized finance.

Due to prolonged disputes over core issues such as stablecoin issuance eligibility, legislative progress on Korea's Digital Asset Basic Law has continued to slow. The BOK has previously advocated that banks maintain a controlling stake in stablecoin issuers, while how stablecoins, RWA, and other digital assets should be incorporated into the existing financial regulatory framework remains a major point of contention in Korea's digital asset legislation.