crypto.news (citing July 19 Etnews): South Korea unveiled a roadmap to make the Korean won a freely convertible currency, pairing foreign-exchange reforms with a legal framework for won-backed stablecoins and new digital payment infrastructure.
Joint announcement by Financial Services Commission, Bank of Korea, Financial Supervisory Service, and Korea Securities Depository. Aims to remove time and location barriers to trading the won and improve cross-border capital flows.
Stablecoins: government plans legal rules for issuing and circulating won-denominated stablecoins under the upcoming Digital Asset Basic Act — legal basis for bringing won-backed stablecoins into the domestic financial system and supporting cross-border fund movement. Act expected to introduce unified framework covering cryptocurrencies and stablecoins; won-backed stablecoins would become an officially recognized issuance category once law takes effect.
CBDC / tokenization: Bank of Korea to expand pilot projects linking institutional CBDC with tokenized government bonds; will participate in BIS Project Agora (cross-border digital payment infrastructure). Earlier this month BoK told lawmakers bank-led consortiums should get priority for won-backed stablecoin issuance (stronger supervision). BoK also expanding deposit-token program (blockchain representations of commercial bank deposits on wholesale CBDC infrastructure) for subsidies, public vouchers, EV charging, everyday payments.
FX modernization: after launch of 24-hour FX trading earlier this month, government plans offshore won settlement network within the Bank of Korea. Overseas financial institutions registered as offshore won settlement entities would let foreign users hold, transfer, and settle won through offshore accounts without opening Korean bank accounts. Plans to more than double reporting thresholds for foreign-currency lending and capital transactions; long term shift from prior-approval system to post-reporting framework.
Primary: https://crypto.news/south-korea-unveils-roadmap-for-won-stablecoins-and-currency-reforms/