Circle warns Korea risks falling behind in digital asset adoption

Korea’s advanced banking and payments infrastructure may be masking the urgency around digital assets, even as the technology is rapidly emerging as a matter of national interest and broader national security worldwide, a Circle executive said Thursday.

While the country can afford to take a cautious approach to regulation, it should not move so slowly that it falls behind in digital asset adoption, he said.

Circle is the issuer of USDC, a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar.

"The urgency, I believe, isn't widely understood nor shared (in Korea)," Circle Chief Strategy Officer Dante Disparte said at a media briefing in Seoul.

He argued that trillions of dollars are already circulating through digital asset products, and the market could expand further as blockchain technology converges with artificial intelligence and autonomous digital agents.

"That's where the urgency comes into play," Disparte said.

"You could afford to be late to the regulation, but you don't necessarily want to be late to the technology (adoption)." He made the comments ahead of Current Seoul, a private industry ga ...