Kyobo Life and SBI Complete Direct Yen-Won Stablecoin Settlement Test

Kyobo Life Insurance and Japan’s SBI Group completed a cross-border stablecoin test on Sept. 17. The pilot used Canton Network to test direct yen-to-won stablecoin settlement without the U.S. dollar as an intermediary. The project began in July with SBI Digital Practice.

The test covered institutional fund transfers, currency conversion, settlement, and transaction tracking. Instead of converting yen into dollars and then won, the structure directly exchanged yen-based and won-based stablecoins. However, the pilot used test tokens, so no real funds or actual stablecoins moved. The companies said the structure could shorten processing times, reduce costs, and improve real-time transaction visibility.

Kyobo Life described the project as the first such end-to-end cross-border institutional fund transfer test by a South Korean insurer. The companies plan to explore digital-asset foreign exchange, asset management, and broader Web3 financial models.