Ripple has partnered with South Korea’s Jeonbuk Bank to deploy Ripple Payments for cross-border remittances.
Ripple said Jeonbuk Bank is the first regional bank in South Korea to deploy the payments infrastructure. As per the official announcement, the partnership is designed to give Jeonbuk Bank’s business customers faster international transfers, with Ripple saying transactions can settle in seconds to minutes rather than taking days through traditional banking channels.
Faster cross-border transfers
Ripple said its payments infrastructure is designed to support near-real-time settlement and 24/7 availability. Jeonbuk Bank will use the service for its global business customers, including import-export companies, IT startups, and online content creators.
Ripple and Jeonbuk Bank said the service is intended to improve the speed and efficiency of cross-border payment flows for those customers.
Ripple expands Korean banking presence
The partnership follows Ripple’s recent deals with South Korean financial institutions covering tokenized assets and institutional custody.
Earlier this year, Ripple partnered with Kyobo Life Insurance to explore blockchain-based settlement of South Korean government bonds. The initiative aims to move the traditional two-day settlement cycle toward near-real-time execution while reducing counterparty risk and improving capital efficiency. Ripple also partnered with Kbank, a South Korean internet-only bank, to deploy institutional wallet infrastructure through Ripple Custody.
Each partnership involves separate areas of financial infrastructure: payments, custody and tokenized-asset settlement.
Fiona Murray, Ripple’s managing director for Asia Pacific, said the Jeonbuk Bank deal reflects growing interest among Korean financial institutions in digital-asset infrastructure. “Regional banks play a vital role in the real economy,” Murray said. She added that Jeonbuk Bank’s deployment would extend near-real-time cross-border settlement to the businesses it serves.
Focus on institutional adoption
For Jeonbuk Bank, the partnership is focused on upgrading an existing financial service rather than introducing a new cryptocurrency trading product.
Jeonbuk Bank President Park Choon-won said the bank wants to strengthen its position in digital finance through the partnership. “This partnership will become a new growth engine for the bank,” Park said.
Ripple said its broader enterprise platform covers payments, custody, liquidity and treasury management. Ripple’s broader offering also includes RLUSD and XRP, although the announcement did not specify whether either asset will be used in Jeonbuk Bank’s deployment.
The latest agreement highlights the increasing role of blockchain infrastructure in traditional financial services, particularly as banks look for faster ways to handle international payments and explore digital assets.
Ripple and Jeonbuk Bank did not disclose the financial terms of the partnership. The next stage will involve the rollout of Ripple Payments to eligible business customers and its adoption within Jeonbuk Bank’s cross-border payment operations.
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