South Korea’s ruling Democratic Party is preparing a draft bill that would classify stablecoins as foreign exchange payment instruments and require tokenized real-world assets (RWAs) to be backed by trust-held assets.
Under the proposed Digital Asset Basic Act, stablecoins used in cross-border transactions would fall under the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act, subjecting related businesses to oversight without separate registration.
The draft also mandates that issuers of tokenized RWAs place underlying assets in managed trusts under the Capital Markets Act, aligning tokenization with existing custody frameworks.
Additionally, the bill bars issuers from paying interest on stablecoins and requires the Financial Services Commission to set technical standards for digital asset interoperability.
This move reflects concerns raised by the Bank of Korea about capital-flow management and foreign exchange stability.