The Bank of Korea has begun its first reported review focused specifically on how traditional financial institutions are entering the virtual asset market and what risks that expansion could create. According to Herald Business reporting on the survey, the central bank sent questionnaires to 18 banks and 13 securities firms on October 23, with responses due by November 4. The group includes KB Kookmin, Shinhan, Hana, Woori and NH NongHyup Bank.
The questionnaire examines organizational structures, budgets, current crypto-related business activities, future plans, risk-management measures and investments in domestic and overseas digital-asset companies. The exercise is intended to fill information gaps around financial institutions’ growing connections to crypto markets rather than impose a new regulatory regime. A BOK official said existing supervisory reporting does not yet provide sufficient coverage of virtual-asset activities.
BOK Tests Exchange, Price and Contagion Shocks
The survey also asks institutions to assess several hypothetical stress scenarios. These include a major hack forcing South Korea’s largest crypto exchange by market share to suspend operations, a steep decline in Bitcoin and other digital-asset prices followed by prolonged weak trading, and heavy crypto-related losses at another financial institution. The questions focus on transmission channels between crypto businesses and conventional finance rather than attempting to forecast any specific market event.
That distinction is important because the review predates the October 29 Binance security incident. The subsequent Binance breach reached approximately $6.3 billion, but the Bank of Korea had already distributed its questionnaire six days earlier. The Binance incident therefore illustrates the type of operational shock contemplated by the survey, rather than serving as its trigger.
The central bank had already been examining deeper financial-market links. Its June Financial Stability Report found that spillovers from global crypto markets into traditional markets had increased substantially since 2020, with particularly visible effects in equities. The BOK’s concern is increasingly about interconnectedness: as banks, brokers and listed companies gain crypto exposure, price or operational shocks can potentially propagate through balance sheets, portfolios and investor sentiment.
Korean Banks Prepare Ahead of Final Crypto Rules
The survey arrives as Korean financial companies explore digital-asset infrastructure before the country’s second-stage regulatory framework is finalized. Kakao Pay and KakaoBank, for example, have agreed with Fireblocks to explore won-stablecoin infrastructure, while Shinhan Card is separately testing potential yen-stablecoin payment models with SBI. Those initiatives remain pilots or exploratory agreements rather than evidence that a commercial Korean stablecoin framework is already operational.
Regulatory work remains unfinished. The Financial Services Commission has repeatedly cautioned that key provisions of Korea’s second-phase digital-asset legislation, including stablecoin issuer requirements, have not yet been finalized. At the same time, separate capital-market reforms have already produced a roadmap for regulated tokenized securities beginning in February 2027. The BOK survey therefore sits alongside a wider institutionalization process, but its findings have not yet been translated into specific prudential rules.
Cybersecurity is separately receiving heightened supervisory attention. In October, the FSC reported that 130 of 555 financial companies identified areas requiring improvement in a sector-wide cybersecurity checklist and proposed more frequent vulnerability testing and stronger threat-sharing mechanisms. That review is a separate initiative from the Bank of Korea survey, although both reflect increasing scrutiny of operational resilience as digital finance expands.
The measurable outcome is an information-gathering exercise covering 31 institutions rather than a new rulebook. What becomes significant after November 4 will depend on what the responses reveal about actual exposure, investment, business activity and risk controls, and whether the Bank of Korea subsequently publishes or acts on those findings.
