TL;DR:
Hana Financial Group, one of South Korea’s leading financial conglomerates, signed a memorandum of understanding with British group Standard Chartered to collaborate on international financial services and digital asset initiatives. The agreement establishes two areas of work: one focused on cryptocurrencies and stablecoins, and another oriented toward investment banking, capital markets and currency cooperation.
The partnership responds to a strategic logic for both institutions. Hana seeks to expand its international presence beyond the Korean market. Standard Chartered, for its part, identifies South Korea as a key financial hub in Asia and aims to consolidate local infrastructure in the region. Ham Young-joo, chairman of Hana Financial Group, stated that the agreement will allow the group to “create new growth opportunities through synergies in digital assets and other financial sectors of the future”.
Recently, Hana Financial led a consortium aimed at issuing won-denominated stablecoins, in which SC First Bank, the Korean subsidiary of Standard Chartered, was already participating. That collaboration turns the MOU into the institutional formalization of a joint project that was already underway.
South Korea’s Financial Services Commission is currently developing guidelines for corporate trading of digital assets and debating how to frame stablecoins within existing foreign exchange legislation. Two institutions of this scale building won-denominated issuance infrastructure generates significant commercial pressure on the regulatory process.
In 2023, Hana Bank partnered with custodian BitGo to develop its own crypto custody service. A year later, together with telecom company SK Telecom, they established BitGo Korea, a company in which it holds a 25% stake. Custody and stablecoin issuance represent the two foundational layers of institutional digital asset infrastructure, and the firm is building both simultaneously.
Standard Chartered, for its part, became in 2025 one of the first international banks to offer spot trading of Bitcoin and Ethereum for institutional clients, and operates custody services across Europe and Asia. According to recent reports, it also ranks among the first candidates to receive a stablecoin issuer license in Hong Kong.
