Dunamu stakes its Visa stablecoin roadmap on a bill the National Assembly is still reviewing
Upbit's parent gets Visa's network and a shortlist that includes an unlaunched consortium dollar coin. There is no launch date yet, because Seoul's draft law may reserve won-stablecoin issuance for bank-controlled groups.
The Investor · Invest desk
What happened
- Dunamu and Visa unveiled a strategic partnership at Visa's Global Market Support Center in San Francisco, with Dunamu chief executive Oh Kyung-seok presenting the roadmap alongside Visa global president Oliver Jenkyn.
- The scope covers stablecoin-based payments, cross-border remittances and settlement, AI-driven financial services and agentic commerce, in which an AI agent buys and pays on a user's behalf.
- Among the coins under examination is OUSD, the dollar-backed token of an Open Standard consortium counting Visa, Mastercard, BlackRock, Circle and more than 140 other institutions, which has not launched.
- Nothing can launch until South Korea passes digital asset legislation, and the Digital Asset Basic Act remains under review at the National Assembly.
- That draft may permit only groups in which commercial banks own at least 51% to issue won-backed stablecoins, a limit that follows Bank of Korea warnings about non-bank issuers.
Why it matters
- What it limits constraint If issuance is closed to it, Dunamu's revenue from any won or dollar coin becomes a share of someone else's reserve income rather than float on its own balance sheet, since the OUSD design rebates distributors and charges nothing to issue or redeem.
- Who's exposed exposure Visa already holds a bank-side option in the same market through its August 24 agreement with Shinhan, so Dunamu is negotiating for a seat it does not occupy alone, and its leverage falls accordingly.
- Who has to decide decision With no target market, service format or date fixed, whatever engineering and compliance spend Dunamu commits here buys legislative optionality rather than revenue, and the calendar belongs to lawmakers.
- What doesn't add up contradiction Dunamu was once named a consortium partner and then said no formal agreement existed, which is reason to read "under review" as the whole of the commitment on either side to any particular coin.
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Start with 51. Hana Financial Group's 6.55% of Dunamu, taken in May specifically to build a won-stablecoin ecosystem with it [10], sits 44.45 percentage points below the bank-ownership floor the draft law contemplates [17]. Add the 4% that Samsung affiliates bought before July talks on stablecoin and AI payments [11] and the outside strategic block on Dunamu's register comes to 10.55% [18]. That leaves Dunamu's outside strategic holders well below a controlling bank stake.
Which makes the coin's fee design the more interesting term, or rather the more interesting version of the question: OUSD passes most of its reserve income back to the banks, card firms and exchanges that distribute it, charges nothing to issue or redeem, and is governed independently rather than by a single operator [6]. A statute that keeps Dunamu out of issuance pushes it toward precisely the seat that structure is built to pay. Whether that seat is worth more than issuer float nobody can say yet, because OUSD has not launched and no reserve yield or volume assumption has been published [5].
On Visa's side the numbers are still pilot-sized. Cryptopolitan puts the network's annualized settlement volume at $7 billion as of April against more than 130 stablecoin-linked card programs in about 40 countries and pilots on nine blockchains [16], which works out to roughly $54 million per program a year [19], or $175 million per country [20]. Visa is buying breadth elsewhere too, having joined the Monetary Authority of Singapore's BLOOM initiative alongside J.P. Morgan, DBS and Circle [15].
The outcome depends on how the law lands. If the Act passes with the 51% floor intact [21], Dunamu ends up the distribution and compliance layer for a bank-controlled issuer, which is a real business with someone else's balance sheet at the centre of it. If a carve-out survives, Dunamu's own public chain Giwa [12] becomes an issuance venue and the Visa link turns into acceptance. If the bill stalls in the National Assembly [9], nothing ships and the roadmap costs both parties a press event in San Francisco.
This is probably wrong, but I would discount the agentic commerce line to near zero for now, because Dunamu will not name a preferred coin, calling OUSD one of several stablecoins under review and saying it is "not prioritizing nor excluding specific stablecoins" [7], which is the language of a firm holding option value open while lawmakers draft. Nothing here is priced until Seoul acts. What would change my mind: a passed Act with an exchange carve-out, or a launched OUSD whose distributor rebate is fat enough that Dunamu would rather not issue at all.
What to watch
- Whether the National Assembly's final Digital Asset Basic Act text keeps the 51% commercial-bank ownership floor for won-stablecoin issuers or writes an exchange carve-out.
- Whether OUSD launches at all, and whether its no-fee, distributor-rebate economics survive contact with an issuing balance sheet.
- Whether Dunamu names a target country, a service format or a launch date before the Korean bill clears committee.
Information, not investment advice. This story is general information about companies and markets, drawn from cited reporting. It is not a recommendation to buy, sell or hold any security; check the cited sources before acting.
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- [1]
Dunamu, parent of South Korea's largest crypto exchange Upbit, has partnered with Visa to develop stablecoin payments, cross-border remittances, AI-driven financial services and agentic commerce.
- [2]
The partnership was unveiled at Visa's Global Market Support Center in San Francisco, where Dunamu chief executive Oh Kyung-seok presented the roadmap alongside Visa global president Oliver Jenkyn.
- [3]
The deal pairs Dunamu's digital asset technology, including custody, transfers and anti-money-laundering tools built up through Upbit, with Visa's payments network.
- [4]
Agentic commerce, one use case the companies plan to explore, is defined as an AI agent searching for a product or service and completing the purchase and payment on the user's behalf.
- [5]
OUSD is the dollar-backed stablecoin of the Open Standard consortium, whose members include Visa, Mastercard, BlackRock, Circle and more than 140 other institutions, and it has not launched yet.
- [6]
Most of OUSD's reserve income is passed back to the banks, card firms and exchanges that distribute it, it has no issuance or redemption fees, and it is designed as shared infrastructure managed through independent governance rather than by a single company.
- [7]
A Dunamu spokesperson said OUSD is one of several stablecoins under review and that the company is "not prioritizing nor excluding specific stablecoins."
- [8]
Dunamu, with several other Korean firms, was once listed as an Open Standard consortium partner, but later said there was no formal agreement to join.
- [9]
The launch of the products depends on South Korea passing legislation governing digital assets; the Digital Asset Basic Act is still being reviewed by the National Assembly.
- [10]
Hana Financial Group took a 6.55% stake in Dunamu in May to jointly build a won-stablecoin ecosystem.
- [11]
Samsung affiliates bought a combined 4% stake in Dunamu before its July talks on stablecoin and AI payments.
- [12]
Dunamu runs its own public blockchain, Giwa.
- [13]
Target countries for the service being built, along with service formats and a launch schedule, have not been set.
- [14]
Shinhan Financial Group signed its own strategic agreement with Visa on August 24 to test stablecoin issuance, remittance and redemption, its second stablecoin partnership in four months.
- [15]
Visa joined BLOOM, a Monetary Authority of Singapore initiative linking traditional payment systems to regulated stablecoin rails, with J.P. Morgan, DBS and Circle among the participants.
- [16]
Visa had an annualized settlement volume of $7 billion as of April and already runs stablecoin pilots across nine blockchains and more than 130 stablecoin-linked card programs in about 40 countries.
- [17]
Hana Financial Group's 6.55% holding in Dunamu is 44.45 percentage points below the 51% commercial-bank ownership level the draft Korean law may require of won-stablecoin issuers.
- [18]
Hana's 6.55% and the Samsung affiliates' combined 4% together account for 10.55% of Dunamu.
- [19]
Visa's $7 billion annualized settlement volume spread across more than 130 stablecoin-linked card programs is roughly $54 million per program per year.
- [20]
Visa's $7 billion annualized settlement volume spread across about 40 countries is $175 million per country per year.
- [21]
The law may allow only groups in which commercial banks own at least 51% to issue won-backed stablecoins, following Bank of Korea warnings about letting non-bank companies issue stablecoins.
Sources
2 independent publishers whose own reporting we read for this story.
- cointelegraph.comVisa works with Upbit parent on stablecoin payments, AI commerce
1 article · August 28, 2026
- cryptopolitan.comUpbit parent Dunamu partners with Visa on stablecoin payments and AI commerce
1 article · August 28, 2026