Bank of Korea Launches 24-Hour Won Settlement Pilot With Four Major Banks
Key Takeaways
- •The Bank of Korea has started trial operations of a round-the-clock won settlement network with KB Kookmin Bank, Woori Bank, Hana Bank, and Shinhan Bank.
- •Full network operations are scheduled to begin in January 2027, when participation is expected to expand to additional domestic institutions and foreign banks.
- •Foreign investors will be able to settle won transactions during their home business hours through Registered Foreign Institutions for KRW Business, without opening accounts directly with South Korean financial institutions.
- •The network runs daily except weekends and public holidays, addressing a time-zone gap that has long restricted foreign investors' access to Korean assets.
- •The pilot forms part of the BOK's broader settlement modernization push, alongside the BIS-led Project Agorá trials and the wholesale CBDC blockchain pilot Project Hangang.
The Bank of Korea (BOK), South Korea's central bank, has launched a pilot of its first 24-hour won settlement network, aimed at allowing foreign investors to settle won transactions outside the country's normal banking hours.
On Monday, the central bank said in an announcement on its official website that its international wire network had started trial operations with four domestic lenders: KB Kookmin Bank, Woori Bank, Hana Bank and Shinhan Bank. Full operations are scheduled for January 2027, when participation is expected to expand to other institutions and foreign banks.
The network will operate around the clock, excluding weekends and public holidays. Foreign investors will be able to settle won transactions during business hours in their home countries through accounts with Registered Foreign Institutions for KRW Business, or RFI-Ks, without opening accounts directly with South Korean financial institutions.
The BOK said it expects the network to help strengthen the won's international standing by improving foreign investors' access to won settlement infrastructure. The limited overlap between South Korea's banking hours and trading hours in the Americas and Europe has long been a hurdle for foreign investors in Korean assets — a constraint rooted in the time zone gap, with Korea Standard Time running nine hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time and leaving most Korean banking hours outside the working day in both regions.
The central bank has also experimented with tokenized settlement infrastructure through Project Agorá, a project led by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). The project completed real-value cross-border payment trials in July using tokenized central bank reserves and commercial bank deposits, including the won.
The BOK is also advancing Project Hangang, a blockchain pilot that uses a wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) to settle tokenized commercial bank deposits. Taken together, the projects form a broader push by the central bank to modernize settlement infrastructure and widen access to the won, with the January 2027 expansion — when more domestic and foreign banks are due to join — the next milestone to watch.
Related coverage: South Korea to test tokenized government bonds with CBDC in 2027
