Visa joins Singapore's BLOOM network and signs Shinhan stablecoin platform deal

Key points

Visa has joined BLOOM, an MAS initiative for regulated stablecoin and tokenised deposit settlement, which already includes JP Morgan and Circle as participants.
Shinhan Financial Group of South Korea signed an agreement to adopt the Visa Stablecoin Platform for stablecoin issuance verification, remittance, and redemption, subject to an evolving Korean regulatory framework.
Shinhan also intends to use stablecoins for card settlement, a capability Visa began trialling approximately five years ago.
Payments firm Nium, which joined Visa's stablecoin settlement pilot in November last year, is Visa's partner for the BLOOM work as well, representing the overlap between the two announcements.
The liquidity rationale for stablecoin-based card settlement centres on continuous seven-day payment capability, which reduces the collateral or prefunding buffer that card networks otherwise require from issuers.

Visa has joined BLOOM, a Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) initiative designed to enable settlement using regulated stablecoins and tokenised deposits, covering distribution and clearing of settlement assets. The network, whose name stands for Borderless, Liquid, Open, Online, Multi-currency, already counts JP Morgan and Circle among its participants alongside several other banks and stablecoin issuers.

Separately, South Korea’s Shinhan Financial Group announced an agreement to adopt Visa’s Stablecoin Platform (VSP), though the language around the deal stops slightly short of a firm commitment. Shinhan plans to use VSP to verify stablecoin issuance, remittance, and redemption, and the two parties intend to explore a viable business model for the Korean market together. Korean stablecoin legislation remains unsettled, which shapes the cautious framing. Beyond potential issuance, Shinhan aims to use stablecoins for card settlement, a function Visa first piloted five years ago and now considers relatively mature.

The BLOOM membership connects to an existing Visa relationship worth noting. Payments firm and card issuer Nium joined Visa’s stablecoin settlement pilot in November last year and is also Visa’s partner for the BLOOM work, making it the thread linking both announcements. The operational logic for card issuers settling via stablecoin is practical rather than novel: settling continuously across seven days reduces the collateral or prefunding that Visa would otherwise require from counterparties such as Nium, shrinking the liquidity buffer both sides must maintain. The more pointed question the source raises is what BLOOM specifically adds to an existing bilateral arrangement between Visa and Nium.

What this means

collateral & funding desk: The Nium case illustrates a concrete balance-sheet benefit worth quantifying: continuous stablecoin settlement across seven days compresses the prefunding buffer a card network demands, and desks running similar bilateral arrangements with Visa should model what that buffer reduction looks like under their own volume and tenor assumptions before treating this as a niche pilot dynamic.
distribution & BD: Shinhan's adoption of VSP under an unsettled Korean legislative environment signals that at least one major Asian financial group is willing to lock in platform relationships ahead of regulatory clarity, which raises the question of whether other regional bank partnerships should be structured similarly to secure positioning before local stablecoin rules crystallise.
regulatory & policy affairs: BLOOM's expanding participant list, now including Visa alongside JP Morgan and Circle, gives MAS a denser testbed for its regulated stablecoin settlement framework, and the gap between BLOOM's multilateral ambitions and the existing Nium bilateral arrangement is worth tracking as an indicator of what the initiative actually adds beyond formalising incumbent relationships.
infrastructure & platform: Visa's dual move, joining BLOOM as a network participant while simultaneously licensing VSP to Shinhan, suggests the platform layer and the settlement network layer are being developed as complementary rather than competing routes, and infrastructure teams evaluating integration priorities should assess whether connecting to BLOOM's clearing rails requires separate build from a VSP integration or can share common components.

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Ledger Insights

ledgerinsights.com

Visa joins Singapore's BLOOM network and signs Shinhan stablecoin platform deal

Key points

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