Thailand’s Siam Commercial Bank introduces stablecoin service for international payments

The Siam Commercial Bank, a major commercial bank in Thailand, has launched stablecoin-based cross-border payment services for its clients. It claims this is the country’s first use case of stablecoins for cross-border remittances in the traditional financial industry.

SCB said in a Wednesday statement that it has partnered with Lightnet and Fireblocks to address infrastructure and custody needs. The project had participated in the Bank of Thailand’s regulatory sandbox and is now “fully commercialized,” the bank said.

SCB explained that the new service improves capital efficiency by eliminating the need for pre-funding between partners, lowering operational costs, and allowing users to transact in local currencies.

“This solution will provide significant improvements to customers’ experience in cross-border money transfer and will lower transaction time and cost and be accessible on a 24/7 basis,” said Tridbodi Arunanondchai, CEO of Lightnet. “This project also promotes financial inclusion as there is a lower capital requirement per transaction.”

Growing stablecoin adoption

In a previous podcast interview with The Block, Michael Shaulov, co-founder and CEO of Fireblocks, said that stablecoins and tokenized real-world assets are onboarding TradFi to crypto. Shaulov noted in the Wednesday statement that SCB’s project sets a new benchmark for integrating stablecoins into mainstream banking services.

Stablecoins, pegged to fiat currencies like the U.S. dollar, are becoming “systemically important,” analysts at research and brokerage firm Bernstein said last month. The total circulating supply of stablecoins currently stands at nearly $180 billion, approaching its all-time high, which was previously reached during the 2022 bear market, according to The Block’s data dashboard .