Kakao, Kraken of Equities? Pay Giant Taps Dinari & Ondo to Tokenize Korean Stocks 🌶️

South Korea's Kakaopay Securities has signed separate agreements with tokenization firms Dinari and Ondo Finance to explore bringing Korean-listed equities onchain and distributing them to international investors, the company announced Tuesday. The partnerships cover sourcing of underlying Korean shares, tokenization infrastructure, and potential cross-border distribution outside South Korea.

Under the Dinari agreement, the companies will run a proof of concept using Dinari's dShares model, which is designed to preserve applicable shareholder rights including dividends and voting. Dinari currently offers 724 tokenized US stocks and ETFs through dShares, and the Kakaopay partnership will explore extending the model to Korean-listed equities. Dinari CEO Gabe Otte told Cointelegraph that no specific Korean-listed companies have been selected for the proof of concept and that no public timeline has been set for commercial availability. Otte said the proposed model would use locally listed Korean shares as the underlying assets rather than tokens that simply track their prices.

Kakaopay's agreement with Ondo will initially focus on establishing a framework for sourcing and custodying Korean-listed shares that could later be tokenized. Kakaopay would operate a foreign investor omnibus account to hold and administer the underlying shares, and the companies will also research token issuance and redemption processes. The firms stated that any decision on whether or when to commercialize tokenized Korean equities will depend on legal and regulatory requirements in South Korea and overseas markets.

The agreements come as South Korea prepares to implement a new regulatory framework for tokenized securities. The country's National Assembly approved amendments in January recognizing distributed ledgers as valid securities registries and permitting the issuance and circulation of token securities. In June, the Financial Services Commission linked the development of token securities infrastructure to a broader overhaul of the country's capital markets. The framework is scheduled to take effect in February 2027, while the Korea Securities Depository is developing infrastructure to connect its existing securities account system with blockchain-based data.

Asked about the appetite for tokenized stocks in South Korea, Otte told Cointelegraph: "We're seeing meaningful institutional interest in South Korea, particularly around tokenization as infrastructure for connecting Korean capital markets with global investors... The opportunity isn't simply to create tokenized versions of Korean equities, but to build infrastructure that can ultimately expand how those equities are distributed internationally while preserving the rights and protections of the underlying securities." Tokenized stocks have surged in 2026, reaching about $3.2 billion in distributed value across available products.