Shinhan Card and SBI Holdings to Trial Yen Stablecoin Payments in South Korea

Shinhan Card, a unit of South Korea’s Shinhan Financial serving roughly 20 million cardholders, has announced a collaboration with SBI VC Trade and SBI XDC Network APAC, both subsidiaries of Japan’s SBI Holdings, to explore yen-backed stablecoin payments across the Korea-Japan corridor. The initiative spans card-linked merchant payments for Japanese visitors transacting in South Korea, peer-to-peer wallet transfers, and stablecoin settlement of cross-border trade payments. Compliance infrastructure, including suspicious-transaction detection and anti-money laundering (AML) controls, will be part of the scope.

The arrangement remains firmly in the exploratory phase: the parties have not identified which stablecoin will be tested, set a trial timeline, or outlined a path to commercial launch. SBI already operates JPYSC, a yen-backed stablecoin issued by SBI Shinsei Trust Bank and launched in June with Startale Group, which had roughly 20.1 billion yen (approximately $127 million) in circulation as of 7 September. However, JPYSC is currently restricted to SBI VC Trade accounts and cannot be transferred to external wallets, with any expansion to public blockchains conditional on regulatory approval and tax clarity. The companies have not confirmed whether JPYSC will feature in the test programme.

For Shinhan, the initiative slots into a broader digital-asset strategy that includes an August agreement with Visa to explore stablecoin issuance, card settlement, and transfers. The Korea-Japan corridor is a logical first target given established tourist and trade flows, but the absence of a named instrument, a named blockchain, and any regulatory green light from either Seoul or Tokyo means the timeline to anything operational is genuinely open. The more immediate question is whether JPYSC’s custody and wallet constraints can be resolved in parallel with whatever regulatory frameworks South Korea and Japan develop for cross-border stablecoin use.