GYEONGJU, North Gyeongsang Province — With APEC leaders gathered in town, the Future Tech Forum put stablecoins at the center of the conversation, framing digital assets as a bridge connecting markets, people and policy.
Held Thursday alongside the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO Summit, the forum opened under the theme “Connecting the Future of Finance.”
In his opening remarks, Oh Kyung-suk, CEO of Dunamu — operator of Upbit, Korea’s largest virtual asset exchange and host of the forum’s digital assets track — said that connection between technology and finance is the foundation of progress.
“Digital assets are no longer a niche innovation; they’ve become the bridge linking technology and finance, markets and people, and economies across regions,” Oh said.
“Today’s sessions explore that connection from stablecoins and AI to financial inclusion and institutional collaboration, all pointing to one shared goal. Building a more open and trusted financial future.”
Michael Casey, chair of the Advanced AI Society and senior adviser at MIT Media Lab's Digital Currency Initiative, described stablecoins as “programmable money” that could redefine global trust and efficiency in his keynote speech.
Casey said blockchain-based currencies represent the next step in the evolution of finance. “Since the days of the Medici, we’ve relied on banks to mediate trust,” he said.
“Now blockchain lets us embed that trust directly into the token itself — reducing cost, friction and dependency on intermediaries.”
Linking the topic to artificial intelligence, Casey said agentic AI systems will soon transact autonomously, demanding programmable, instant-settlement currencies. “Machines won’t wait two days for payment,” he said. “The kind of money we design will decide who controls the AI economy, humans or machines.”
Following the keynote, the “Stablecoins & Cross-Border Innovation: Bridging Global Finance and Regulation” panel, moderated by Dunamu Chief Brand and Impact Officer Yoon Seon-joo, brought together Casey, Ly Yin of the Solana Foundation and Paul Blustein of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Blustein, author of "King Dollar: The Past and Future of the World's Dominant Currency," questioned whether stablecoins could challenge US financial hegemony. “It’s ironic that a technology born from libertarian ideals is now seen as a tool to entrench US power,” he said, warning that dollar-pegged tokens could erode smaller nations’ policy control.
Solana’s Ly Yin highlighted Asia’s pragmatic approach, citing partnerships among banks, payment networks and Web3 firms in Korea, Japan and Hong Kong.
“Governments can spur demand by tokenizing corporate bonds or treasury assets with local-currency stablecoins,” he said.
Casey countered that innovation must not be stifled. “A single Silicon Valley-led currency would homogenize the world’s economy,” he said. “We need sovereign solutions that interoperate through open standards, not one currency ruling them all.”
As the session wrapped, panelists agreed that stablecoins have moved from the fringes of crypto into the core of global finance.
Yin called them “catalysts for the next phase of cross-border growth,” while Blustein stressed maintaining “trust, transparency and rule of law.”
Moderator Yoon closed with a note of optimism, concluding, “Stablecoins have evolved from a technical experiment into a real bridge between blockchain innovation and global finance. The task now is to make that bridge both transparent and responsible.”
hnpark@heraldcorp.com
