Kakao Pay and Kakao Bank have signed a memorandum of understanding with Fireblocks to jointly explore digital asset infrastructure for the Korean market, with an initial focus on stablecoins, according to Kakao Group’s announcement. The three companies plan to assess digital asset distribution frameworks suited to Korea’s regulatory, security and service requirements, and to run proof-of-concept tests on those frameworks as part of building out the country’s early digital asset ecosystem.
Fireblocks, which the release says has deployed digital asset infrastructure for more than 2,500 institutions including over 100 banks and has secured $16 trillion in digital asset transactions across more than 200 blockchains, brings the kind of institutional custody and transaction infrastructure that regulated banks typically require before touching onchain assets directly. Fireblocks chief executive and co-founder Michael Shaulov said reliable infrastructure engineered to meet institutional requirements “from day one” is a prerequisite for widespread adoption, and that “Kakao Pay and Kakao Bank are setting the groundwork now.” Kakao Bank chief executive Yun Ho-young and Kakao Pay chief executive Shin Won-keun, who co-head Kakao Group’s Stablecoin Task Force, both signed onto the deal, with Yun saying the companies would “develop secure and accessible digital asset services that expand our customers’ financial opportunities,” and Shin calling the alliance “an important foundation” for reliable digital asset distribution in Korea.
The Fireblocks agreement is Kakao’s second major stablecoin-infrastructure partnership this year rather than a standalone move. In July, Kakao Corp., Kakao Pay and Kakao Bank signed a separate memorandum of understanding with Circle to develop blockchain-based payment infrastructure and explore a won-backed stablecoin, with Shin saying at the time that competitiveness in digital assets “cannot be achieved through technology alone.”
Kakao has also been building its own consumer-facing layer in parallel: Kakao Pay completed proof-of-concept testing of a digital asset wallet in a large-scale user environment covering transfers, payments and settlement of onchain assets, extending its existing prepaid balance service, which serves 43 million users, according to Seoul Economic Daily’s reporting on the wallet’s development, while KakaoBank works to link that wallet to its banking systems under bank-level security and regulatory controls.
Taken together, the three moves sketch a full-stack approach: Circle for stablecoin issuance and payment rails, Fireblocks for the institutional custody and transaction infrastructure banks are expected to demand, and Kakao’s own wallet build for the consumer-facing layer riding on top of KakaoTalk’s user base. The buildout comes as competition among Korean financial institutions to establish won-stablecoin infrastructure intensifies ahead of a security token regulatory framework due to take effect on February 4, 2027, with rivals including Naver Financial, Dunamu, Hana Financial Group, Samsung affiliates, KB Financial, Woori Bank and Mirae Asset-owned Korbit all pursuing their own stablecoin or digital-asset tie-ups in advance of Korea’s still-incomplete legislative framework, according to UPI’s reporting on the broader race.