KakaoBank, one of South Korea’s online-only banks with nearly 20 million users, said in an earnings call last week it will start providing withdrawal and deposit accounts for users of local cryptocurrency exchange Coinone in November.
The two companies announced their partnership in August, but didn’t say when Coinone users will have access through KakaoBank accounts.
Coinone is one of South Korea’s five cryptocurrency exchanges that are licensed to provide fiat-to-crypto services to their customers, having met the country’s anti-money laundering requirements. These include a bank partnership to provide user accounts under real names.
With the KakaoBank agreement, Coinone will end its partnership with Korea’s NH Nonghyup Bank set up in Sept. 2021, local media reported.
The crypto exchange told Forkast that they will soon make an announcement on how the transition will affect customers, declining to comment on whether users with NH Nonghyup accounts will have to move to Kakao to continue trading on Coinone.
Local media said Coinone is making the change to increase the limit on online withdrawal and deposits.
Coinone’s current “easy deposit” feature allows a daily deposit of a million Korean won (about US$709), while local exchange leader Upbit allows a daily amount of a hundred million won. Upbit is partnering with K-Bank, another internet-only bank.