South Korean Institutions Shift Toward Web3 Implementation at Seoul Finance Forum

South Korea’s institutional finance community is increasingly moving from ‘curiosity’ to implementation on Web3, as TokenPost convened a closed-door forum in Seoul to debate stablecoins, custody, onchain financial infrastructure, and the regulatory playbook needed for real-world deployment.

TokenPost, a leading Korean digital-asset media outlet, hosted the “The Institutional Web3 Forum: Beyond Banking – Web3 for Institutions 2026” on Tuesday 04:00 UTC (Tuesday 12:00 ET) at the Glad Hotel in Yeouido, Seoul. The event was co-organized with the Korea Fintech Industry Association (KORFIN) and the Open Blockchain & DID Association (OBDIA), bringing together roughly 100 pre-invited participants from commercial banks, securities firms, insurers, fintechs, and the domestic digital-asset sector. Exchanges Bithumb, Coinone, and Korbit joined as official sponsors.

The agenda was designed around the institutional investor’s lens—less about evangelizing blockchain’s novelty and more about identifying where ‘execution’ is feasible within existing financial controls. Sessions included presentations from global Web3 firms, a panel discussion focused on onboarding and compliance, and a demonstration of an onchain data intelligence platform for institutional workflows.

In opening remarks, TokenPost CEO Jiho Kim framed 2026 as a year in which digital-asset rails are no longer peripheral to finance. “Central banks around the world are designing CBDCs, banks are executing real transactions on blockchains, and stablecoins are becoming borderless payment infrastructure,” Kim said, arguing that Web3 is now “the next layer” for regulated finance rather than an experiment.

Kim also acknowledged the gap facing Korean institutions, describing Web3 as something they “need to understand” but often struggle to operationalize amid shifting rules and fast-moving technology. The forum, he said, was intended to provide ‘practical’ answers by pairing frontline industry perspectives—spanning First Digital, Kaia, Ledger, Ripple, and Canton Network—with discussions on regulation, onboarding, and data, alongside partners including Axis Law, Sign, and Insight3.

TokenPost Chairman Seongmin Kwon expanded that theme in a keynote titled “Why Institutions Can’t Ignore Web3,” emphasizing that the decisive question for banks and other incumbents is not whether the technology is innovative, but whether it removes measurable bottlenecks without raising unacceptable risk. “Institutions don’t move because something is trendy,” he said. “They move when the old way is clearly broken, and the new approach is safer, cheaper, and faster.”

Kwon argued that much of the stalemate stems from finance and Web3 speaking “two languages”: the former prioritizing risk, accountability, and operational feasibility, while the latter stresses that infrastructure is already changing. Bridging those perspectives, he said, requires evaluating specific performance improvements—shorter settlement times, lower cross-border remittance costs, easier collateral and liquidity management, and audit-ready data for regulators. Answering those points is what turns Web3 from a concept into ‘infrastructure,’ he added.

On stablecoins, Kwon said their share of the overall payments universe remains modest, but the direction is increasingly clear as usage expands beyond exchange liquidity into business payments, remittances, settlement, and payouts. He pointed to rapid growth in real-economy payment activity and highlighted that the most meaningful momentum is emerging in B2B flows, where transaction efficiency and reconciliation can translate directly into operational savings.

He also described a shift in who is driving adoption—from startups to established financial infrastructure companies. Citing high-profile moves such as Mastercard’s activity around stablecoin infrastructure, Stripe’s acquisitions in the space, and Circle’s push to provide 24/7 off-ramps, Kwon said the common thread is that major payment and liquidity networks are pulling tokenized money into their core stacks rather than keeping it in a separate ‘sandbox.’ Over time, he argued, these integrations tend to become standards: “It enters quietly, works as a feature, then becomes the default.”

Regulatory developments are also helping narrow the uncertainty premium, Kwon said, pointing to ongoing rulemaking in major hubs such as Hong Kong and Singapore, alongside active debates in Korea. He also referenced the U.S. “GENIUS” bill as part of a broader global trend toward clearer frameworks for tokenized money and compliant digital-asset rails.

The forum’s global speaker lineup focused on institutional expansion strategies across Asia-Pacific, with sessions led by Vincent Chok of First Digital on stablecoin technology and regional go-to-market approaches; Yoonho Lee of Kaia Investment Partners on “real yield” and value capture; Takatoshi Shibayama of Ledger Enterprise APAC on the security paradox created by technological progress; Thomas Chow of Canton Network APAC on standards for institutional onchain finance; and Eunjin Lee of Ripple APAC on digital-asset adoption in financial services and cross-border payments innovation. Axis Law’s Taerim Kim also delivered a compliance-focused briefing tailored to institutions evaluating Web3 exposure.

A panel discussion titled “Practical Q&A for Entering Regulated Finance: The Onboarding–Data–Regulation Triangle” was scheduled to examine implementation hurdles with participation from Sign Korea and Insight3, while TokenPost COO Jonghoon Han was set to present an institutional-oriented onchain data intelligence demonstration. The event concluded with a private VIP networking reception for attendees, speakers, and sponsors.

Organizers positioned the gathering as a checkpoint for whether Korea’s financial sector is ready to move from pilots to production. With stablecoins, custody, and onchain infrastructure now intersecting directly with regulated workflows, the discussions underscored a central takeaway: institutional adoption is increasingly likely to be decided not by ideology, but by ‘operational’ proofs—where measurable efficiency gains can be achieved without compromising compliance and risk governance.