Project Pangea is trying to move foreign-exchange settlement from a traditional 48-hour process to near-instant settlement using regulated euro- and South Korean won-pegged stablecoins.
That is the real signal beneath the headline. Chainlink is reportedly joining several dozen international banks on a cross-border stablecoin payments project, according to PYMNTS. The project is not aimed at retail crypto payments. It targets the harder layer: bank-to-bank settlement for FX trades, where speed only matters if legal finality, compliance, liquidity, and auditability hold up under institutional pressure.
Banks Are Taking Stablecoins Into the Hardest Part of FX: Cross-Border Settlement
For years, stablecoins sat mostly on the crypto side of finance. Project Pangea suggests banks are now testing whether the same technology can solve a core institutional problem: the gap between executing an FX trade and actually settling the money.
The project includes Qivalis, a euro stablecoin group of 37 European banks, and UniKA, a Korean banking alliance made up of more than 10 commercial banks, alongside Chainlink. That composition matters. This is not a startup pitching banks from the outside. It is a bank-heavy group testing whether tokenized cash can fit inside regulated FX workflows.
Chainlink’s role should be read as infrastructure, not bank replacement. The question is whether blockchain rails can connect regulated institutions without forcing them to give up control over compliance, settlement certainty, or operational records.
XOOMAR analysis: if real-time stablecoin settlement works for FX trades, it would attack one of global finance’s oldest inefficiencies. Not the trade itself. The lag after the trade.
Inside Project Pangea: Chainlink, Global Banks, and Real-Time Stablecoin FX Payments
The stated goal is direct: bring real-time, stablecoin-based cross-border payments for foreign-exchange trades within roughly a year. Niki Ariyasinghe, Chainlink’s vice president of Asia-Pacific and the Middle East, told CoinDesk the project is aimed at live transactions inside a legal and regulatory framework.
“This is not just a POC,” Ariyasinghe said. “Everyone’s coming in with their eyes wide open. Appetite is very much about building real infrastructure … The target is live transactions within a legal, regulatory compliance framework within the next 12 months.”
The settlement design centers on atomic payment-versus-payment settlement. In plain terms, both sides of a currency trade settle at the same time, or neither settles. That structure is meant to reduce counterparty and settlement risk because one party is not left waiting after delivering its side of the trade.
A simplified version of the workflow looks like this:
- Trade execution: A bank enters an FX transaction involving euro and won exposure.
- Tokenized settlement: Regulated euro- and South Korean won-pegged stablecoins move across the agreed corridor.
- Atomic exchange: Both legs settle together, or the transaction fails.
- Verification: Participating institutions need records that satisfy compliance, audit, and reconciliation requirements.
Chainlink’s value proposition sits in the connective tissue. Related reporting says the project uses Chainlink infrastructure for connectivity and data, with FairSquareLab contributing on-chain FX settlement technology. That is the same institutional plumbing problem XOOMAR examined in Tokenization Hype Hits Wall Street’s Plumbing Problem: tokenization only matters when it plugs into real financial operations.
The Numbers Behind the Prize: FX Volumes, Settlement Risk, and Stablecoin Liquidity
The prize is large because FX is large. Related reporting cites the Bank for International Settlements figure that global foreign exchange markets process roughly $9.6 trillion in daily trading volume. Even small changes to settlement speed, liquidity requirements, or operational failure rates can matter when applied to that scale.
PYMNTS frames the current pain point clearly: cross-border payments remain weighed down by correspondent banking chains, pre-funded accounts, foreign exchange friction, compliance overhead, and opaque fees. Project Pangea is aimed at one specific part of that tangle: replacing delayed settlement with near-instant movement of regulated stablecoins.
The comparison is sharp:
| Settlement model | Core mechanism | Main friction |
|---|---|---|
| Traditional cross-border FX settlement | Bank messaging, intermediaries, reconciliation | Time lag, prefunding, counterparty exposure |
| Project Pangea model | Regulated euro and won stablecoins, atomic PvP | Legal finality, compliance integration, liquidity depth |
The metrics that will decide whether Chainlink stablecoin FX settlement is serious are not promotional. They are operational:
- Settlement time: Does near-instant settlement happen consistently?
- Failure rate: How often do atomic swaps fail, and why?
- Volume: Are live transactions meaningful or symbolic?
- Corridors: Does it stay euro-won, or expand?
- Controls: Are sanctions checks, identity rules, and audit trails bank-grade?
- Reserves: Can stablecoin issuers support redemption confidence under institutional flows?
From Correspondent Banking to Tokenized Cash, Why This Trial Feels Different
Project Pangea feels different because it is not pitching blockchain as a parallel universe. It is trying to insert tokenized cash into existing bank workflows for a specific settlement job.
That distinction matters. PYMNTS notes that stablecoins may help unlock a “missing settlement layer” in global payments. Chainlink’s own educational material also describes stablecoin settlement as a move from pure messaging toward value transfer, where the asset itself moves rather than institutions only exchanging instructions.
XOOMAR analysis: the bank interest here is practical, not ideological. If banks can keep familiar compliance processes while compressing settlement time, stablecoins become infrastructure. If they cannot, Project Pangea remains another controlled test with limited reach.
The regulatory side cannot be brushed aside. Stablecoins may reduce settlement friction, but PYMNTS also flags the risk record around digital asset bridge solutions, saying hacks on bridges account for around 40% of the entire value of crypto lost due to hacks across the sector’s history. That is why bank-grade stablecoin settlement has to prove security and control, not just speed.
This is where XOOMAR’s coverage of £40B Cap Rewrites Bank of England Stablecoin Rules is relevant for readers tracking the policy layer. Stablecoin settlement is moving closer to banking infrastructure, and that raises the bar for oversight.
Bankers, Regulators, Stablecoin Issuers, and Chainlink Each Want a Different Win
Each participant group has a different definition of success.
| Stakeholder | Likely win | Constraint |
|---|---|---|
| Banks | Faster settlement, less trapped liquidity, better FX operations | No tolerance for compliance shortcuts |
| Regulators | Controlled innovation with clear records | Systemic risk, AML, sanctions, operational resilience |
| Stablecoin issuers | Proof that tokens can support institutional settlement | Reserve quality, licensing, redemption reliability |
| Chainlink | Validation as institutional blockchain infrastructure | Must prove reliability inside bank workflows |
PYMNTS quotes Tanner Taddeo, CEO of Stable Sea, making the enterprise adoption point bluntly:
“CFOs are, rightly so, conservative,” Tanner Taddeo said. “They’re not buying innovation. They’re buying to de-risk something … It’s a crawl, walk, run approach to the enterprise because that trust does take time. It’s never given, it’s always earned.”
That quote captures the whole project. Banks do not need a faster toy. They need something that lowers risk without creating a new one.
What Project Pangea Could Change for Banks, Corporates, and Payments Firms
If Project Pangea works, banks could move part of FX settlement away from slow correspondent chains and toward programmable liquidity. That could mean faster reconciliation and more precise treasury operations across approved corridors.
For multinational companies, the value would be indirect but important. Faster FX settlement can reduce working capital drag and improve visibility into when money actually moves. PYMNTS specifically notes that stablecoins can compress settlement time and capital requirements at once, especially in emerging markets where access to dollar liquidity remains uneven.
For fintechs and payment processors, the tension is competitive. Many non-bank cross-border providers sell speed and transparency. If major banks can offer stablecoin settlement with institutional controls, that selling point narrows.
XOOMAR analysis: the risk is concentration. A stablecoin-based FX layer could reduce friction, but it may also put more power in the hands of a small group of issuers, infrastructure providers, and participating banks. The project’s design, governance, and access rules will matter as much as the technology.
Project Pangea’s First Test Is Narrow Execution, Not Global Replacement
The next year will not determine whether stablecoins replace the global FX settlement stack. It will determine whether regulated stablecoins can handle live bank transactions under legal and compliance constraints.
A realistic first phase would likely stay narrow: limited corridors, approved participants, controlled transaction types, and heavy oversight. The source reporting supports that caution. The stated target is live transactions within a legal and regulatory framework, not an open global network.
The evidence to watch is practical: actual transaction volume, live settlement times, failed transaction data, participating bank expansion, reserve transparency, and regulatory treatment in Europe and South Korea.
If those indicators hold up, Chainlink stablecoin FX settlement could move stablecoins closer to bank-grade settlement infrastructure. If they do not, Project Pangea will be remembered as another promising test that proved speed is the easy part. The hard part is trust.
Disclaimer: This XOOMAR analysis is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not financial, investment, legal, tax, or professional advice. It does not provide buy, sell, hold, price-target, portfolio, or personalized recommendations. Verify information independently and consult qualified professionals before making decisions.
Impact Analysis
- Project Pangea tests whether stablecoins can reduce FX settlement from 48 hours to near-instant processing.
- The involvement of 37 European banks and more than 10 Korean commercial banks signals serious institutional interest.
- If successful, the project could modernize cross-border settlement without removing banks from compliance and control.
Originally published on XOOMAR. For more news and analysis, visit XOOMAR.
