During the past week Circle’s President Heath Tarbert visited Korea and held meetings with the central bank and big four commercial banks, KB Kookmin, Shinhan, Hana and Woori. Multiple news outlets reported that Circle has no intention of participating in the issuance of a won stablecoin. Instead, Mr Tarbert aimed to discuss how banks could leverage its USDC token, which reached a market capitalization of $70 billion yesterday.

Most of Korea’s large banks are part of a consortium that’s exploring the issuance of stablecoins. Currently stablecoins in Korea are unregulated, with two sets of competing draft laws submitted to the National Assembly. However, this legislation will primarily address domestically issued stablecoins, rather than offshore tokens.

Korean news outlets speculated that part of Circle’s strategy was to extend the usage of USDC for remittances and cross border payments. Mr Tarbert may also have aimed to persuade banks to adopt USDC before the topic of offshore tokens is addressed by legislation. While that might sound counterintuitive, there’s some logic to this approach.

Article continues …