TokenSquare, a South Korean AI payments infrastructure company, has launched KRWQ, a KRW-denominated stablecoin infrastructure built on BSV blockchain technology, in partnership with the Swiss-based BSV Association. The system is designed for real-time payments, micropayments, and institutional settlement using won-based digital rails.
The project follows a memorandum of understanding signed in June 2025, followed by months of technical validation, node design work, and commercialization planning, according to TokenPost.
KRWQ is built on BSV’s Teranode architecture, which the project says has demonstrated the ability to process more than 1 million transactions per second in AWS test environments.
KRWQ aims to serve as a won-based infrastructure for real-time payment processing on a large scale in Korea, TokenSquare CEO Oh Eun-jung said, as reported by TokenPost. The company also sees potential use cases in AI payments, micropayments, enterprise settlement, and broader digital commerce, rather than positioning KRWQ as a standalone crypto asset.
One KRWQ is for payments, the other is for trading
KRWQ is entering a market where several projects are trying to bring the Korean won to blockchain rails.
One of the most confusing aspects is that another separate project, also called KRWQ – developed by IQ and Frax Finance – is already listed on EDX Markets. This edition focuses on institutional trading and is the first non-USD stablecoin to be traded across the platform’s spot and perpetual futures markets, according to EDX Markets.
This issuance is designed for traders seeking exposure to liquidity of the Korean Won, including hedging activity associated with non-deliverable futures (NDF) markets, the volume of which exceeds $100 billion.
According to TRADE News, executives involved in EDX-listed KRWQ describe it as a tool for regulated trading and hedging of Korean won exposure via spot and derivatives markets. EDX Markets also positioned the listing as part of its broader drive to expand institutional access to non-USD digital assets in regulated markets.
The TokenSquare release takes a completely different direction. Instead of focusing on commerce, it targets everyday payment infrastructure within South Korea.
The company signed custody arrangements with Korea Digital Asset (KODA) and built compliance tools, including KYC/AML enforcement, address controls, and funds tying capabilities, into its system, according to TokenPost.
Regulators in Korea have not settled on who should control stablecoins
South Korea’s Digital Assets Basic Law, the proposed framework for regulating the issuance of stablecoins, remains stuck in a legislative impasse.
According to a Korea Times contribution by Andrey Grachev, managing partner at DWF Labs, organizers remain divided. The Bank of Korea supports a model that requires banks to hold a majority stake in any stablecoin issuer, while the Financial Services Commission (FSC) is considering a more flexible approach similar to the European MiCA framework.
Despite the uncertainty, market activity is already happening.
KRWQ’s daily trading volume sometimes reached around 1 billion won (about $700,000), driven largely by foreign investors hedging exposure to Korean stocks, Kim Gyu-jin, CEO of Tiger Research, said at a National Assembly symposium in April.
South Korea is home to an estimated 18 million cryptocurrency investors, one of the highest participation rates globally, according to the Korea Times. One persistent feature of the market is the so-called “kimchi premium,” where crypto assets often trade at higher prices domestically than on global exchanges, a sign of strong domestic demand for digital currency exposure.
BSV’s Teranode gives TokenSquare its own payment offering
In the heart KRWQ BSV’s Teranode architecture, designed to prioritize high transaction throughput and low-cost settlement at scale.
In simple terms, the design focuses less on complex smart contract applications and more on moving large amounts of transactions quickly and efficiently. This contrasts with networks like Ethereum, which is built around programmable smart contracts, or Solana, which also focuses on speed but uses a different architecture to scale.
BSV proponents argue that this type of structure is more suitable for real-world payment systems, especially micropayments, machine-to-machine transactions, and real-time settlement flows, which could become more important in AI-driven economies.
However, many of these performance claims remain largely within controlled or testing environments, and large-scale national rollout has not yet been proven.
Global stablecoin initiatives other than the US dollar
| project | currency | Primary focus | Infrastructure | Market positioning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| KRWQ (Token Square) | South Korean won | Local payments, project settlement | BSV Tyranod | Real-time payments layer in Korea |
| KRWQ (IQ/Frax, EDX) | South Korean won | Forex trading, hedging | Multi-chain stablecoin bars | Institutional derivatives and spot |
| EURC (circle) | euro | Euro payments | Multi-chain | Regulated euro digital cash |
| XSGD (StraitsX) | Singapore dollar | Cross-border payments | Ethereum/Zilliqa | Settlement class in Southeast Asia |
| External CNH stablecoins | CNH | Overseas RMB exposure | Multi-chain | Hedging markets in foreign exchange |
| BRZ (old version) | Brazilian real | Cases of payment and use of foreign currencies | Ethereum | Latin American Cryptocurrencies |
While stablecoins pegged to the US dollar still dominate global liquidity, non-US dollar stablecoins are slowly expanding as countries explore digital settlement systems in local currency.
What this means for global payments
The launch of KRWQ highlights a broader shift in the stablecoin market: coins are beginning to shift from being mere trading pairs to becoming full-fledged payment infrastructures.
If systems like KRWQ gain adoption, they could reduce reliance on traditional banking paths, speed up settlement times, and enable new forms of programmable payments, including automated transactions between machines and AI systems.
But the trend remains uncertain. Competing models, ranging from stablecoins focused on institutional trading to local payments infrastructure, may end up fragmenting liquidity across different systems rather than unifying it.
In South Korea, the outcome will depend largely on how lawmakers resolve the digital asset basic law. This decision will likely determine whether won-based stablecoins will become tightly bank-regulated instruments or evolve into a broader digital payment infrastructure integrated with global cryptocurrency markets.
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