KB Kookmin’s move comes on the heels of its selection for a government-backed deposit token project run by Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT and the Korea Internet & Security Agency.

The initiative aligns with KB Kookmin’s broader blockchain push, including digital bond issuance, tokenized deposits, and stablecoin payment development in South Korea.

The new service will integrate with SWIFT rather than replacing it, allowing blockchain settlement while maintaining the established international payment framework.

KB Kookmin Bank becomes the first South Korean financial institution to adopt Kinexys for corporate trade payments, following a signed agreement with JPMorgan to expand blockchain-based remittance services.

KB Kookmin Bank will launch a blockchain-powered cross-border payment service for import and export clients in August, initially processing US dollar payments over JPMorgan’s Kinexys network.

The service will operate across ten countries, enabling faster USD transfers from Korea to the United States, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, India, Thailand, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, South Africa, and back to Korea, with KB Kookmin’s Korea and Singapore offices facilitating the rails.

The service will enable faster USD transfers across the ten countries via KB Kookmin’s Korean branches and its Singapore office.

Kinexys has been expanding across markets and currencies and is already used by institutions like Qatar National Bank to shorten settlement times from days to minutes.

KB Financial Group remains Korea’s largest banking group by assets, underscoring the significance and scale of KB Kookmin’s Kinexys rollout in the region.

This move reflects a wider trend of institutional banks adopting blockchain to boost cross-border payment efficiency by leveraging existing networks rather than building new ones.

The rollout will test tokenized deposits’ reach beyond JPMorgan’s clients and could influence adoption among other Korean lenders.

Kinexys, JPMorgan’s institutional blockchain platform for payments and digital asset settlement, has processed over $4 trillion since launch, with average daily transactions around $7 billion, and operates on a permissioned network with programmable payments.