Chainlink announced on June 23, 2026, the launch of "Project Pangea," a joint initiative with European and South Korean banking consortia to enable instant foreign exchange settlement using stablecoins. The project involves dozens of financial institutions managing over $10 trillion in assets, aiming to build a settlement network that directly exchanges euro and Korean won stablecoins while maintaining compatibility with the existing Swift messaging system.
Project Pangea: A three-layer structure connecting banks
Project Pangea is led by UniKA (Unified Korea Alliance), a consortium of South Korean banks, and Qivalis, a European euro-denominated stablecoin alliance. UniKA includes five operating committee members—Shinhan Bank, JB Bank, and Kbank among them—along with over 10 major commercial banks. On the European side, 37 banks support Qivalis in its effort to issue euro-backed stablecoins. FairSquareLab, a South Korean digital asset infrastructure firm, acts as the bridge between the two alliances, providing on-chain foreign exchange settlement technology.
The project adopts a three-layer architecture consisting of the bank system layer, the connectivity layer, and the settlement layer. Chainlink's oracle services are used to obtain market exchange rates, ensuring minimal price slippage during currency swaps. Settlement is finalized on a dedicated blockchain called "Pangea L1," designed to be neutral and independent of any single country or bank.
Addressing the cost of dollar intermediation for the won
The initiative tackles a structural issue in the global FX market: uneven liquidity across currency pairs. With daily FX trading volume exceeding $9.6 trillion, many transactions—especially those involving the Korean won—are routed through the US dollar, increasing costs and settlement times. FairSquareLab CEO Kim Jun-hong stated that Project Pangea is not just about efficiency but about opening a direct link for the won to global currency markets. Jean-Luc Gustave of Qivalis noted that connecting regulated euro and won stablecoins for instant settlement eliminates traditional settlement risk and reduces intraday liquidity costs.
Growing adoption of blockchain in traditional finance
Fernando Vazquez, head of capital markets at Chainlink Labs, called the project a major milestone in reshaping how value moves globally. The move follows a broader trend of financial institutions embracing blockchain: in May, the US clearing house DTCC announced it would adopt Chainlink's infrastructure for its collateral management system. Project Pangea is designed to let banks migrate settlement to the blockchain without abandoning Swift, ensuring backward compatibility with existing systems. The consortium plans to proceed with regulatory coordination and technical testing, aiming to demonstrate interbank settlement using euro and won stablecoins.