Yoon Seong-gwan, BOK Division Head: "Market Accessibility Is Key to Tokenization; Korea Must Make Its Financial Market More Attractive" [KBW 2026]

[Financial News] "The fundamental value of tokenization lies in improving market accessibility. Even if the Korean economy improves and government bonds become more attractive, Korea could lose the appeal of its market if accessibility declines."
Yoon Seong-gwan, head of the BOK’s Digital Currency Division, made the remarks during the session "Digital Currency and the Future Monetary System: Korea’s Next Financial Structure" at KBW 2026, held on the 30th at WALKERHILL HOTELS & RESORTS in Seoul. "Countries around the world, including those in Europe as well as the United States, are all moving into real-world asset (RWA) tokenization," he said.
The BOK is pursuing Project Han-gang, which converts bank deposits into deposit tokens, alongside Project Agora, a cross-border payments initiative. While Project Han-gang is an experiment involving domestic payment infrastructure, Project Agora seeks to shift cross-border correspondent banking systems to distributed ledger technology (DLT).
Project Agora is designed to tokenize accounts and payment procedures managed by central banks and correspondent banks in each country for use in cross-border remittances and foreign exchange transactions. "We are discussing not only ways to improve correspondent banking systems through Project Agora, but also ways to use it as a foundation to support various digital assets," Yoon said.
Yoon identified legal settlement finality as a key feature of Project Agora. "The fact that a transaction has been processed technologically does not mean that settlement is legally final," he said. "It is important to guarantee settlement finality under each country’s legal system so that completed payments cannot be repudiated even in the event of bankruptcy," he emphasized. Project Agora has completed its prototype and live-transaction tests. It is expected to establish the governance structure of participating countries and a rulebook—the operating and settlement rules that participating countries and institutions must follow—in 2027, undergo each country’s review and approval procedures, and begin procedures for system operation in 2028.
Yoon rejected concerns that Project Han-gang could lead to surveillance of personal information or control over funds. "It has absolutely nothing to do with the government monitoring it because it is issued by the BOK," he said. "It simply uses identity information managed by banks in a blockchain-based system; it is not structured in a way that allows the BOK to access that information." He added, "The major significance of Project Han-gang is that it converts deposits into a new form called deposit tokens and gives them an innovative character."
The pilot project for government bond tokenization planned for next year is also an extension of this strategy to expand market accessibility. Yoon said, "Government bond tokenization could have various benefits, such as reducing the inefficiencies of paperwork," but added, "Fundamentally, its greatest value is improving market participants’ access and boosting the competitiveness of Korea’s financial market."
[email protected] Lee Jung-hwa and Kim Hyung-min Reporter