South Korea’s Shinhan Financial Group has signed a strategic business agreement with Visa to collaborate on stablecoins, artificial intelligence and B2B payments as part of its “future finance” initiative. The partnership, announced Wednesday and reported by Yonhap News Agency, will use Visa’s stablecoin platform to test core functions including issuance, remittances and redemption.
Under the agreement, the two companies will jointly design a South Korea-specific business model tailored to the domestic financial environment. The collaboration also covers joint pilot projects for card payment settlements using stablecoins, development of AI-based future payment models and expansion of B2B and B2C payment businesses. Shinhan said it would combine capabilities of major subsidiaries including Shinhan Bank, Shinhan Card and Jeju Bank with Visa’s global payment network and digital technology.
Jin Ok-dong, CEO of Shinhan Financial Group, said: “Through this agreement, we have expanded our long-standing partnership with Visa to the broader digital finance sector. Going forward, we will combine Shinhan’s financial capabilities with Visa’s global infrastructure to jointly design new future finance models and deliver differentiated financial experiences to our customers.”
The move comes as South Korea advances digital asset legislation, including efforts to establish the Digital Asset Basic Act covering stablecoins, virtual asset service provider licensing and crypto exchange-traded funds. Shinhan has already been active in digital asset experimentation: in April, Shinhan Card partnered with the Solana Foundation to trial stablecoin payment systems on the Layer 1 blockchain, and earlier this month Shinhan’s asset management arm signed a four-party memorandum of understanding with the Solana Foundation, Etherfuse and Orca to test issuance and distribution of a Korean won-denominated tokenized fund.
For consumers and businesses, stablecoin-based payment systems could offer faster and cheaper remittances and settlement, though adoption will depend on regulatory clarity and the security of underlying digital assets.
