SCB Partners with Lightnet to Revolutionize Cross-Border Payments and Remittances with Stablecoin, Powered by Fireblocks

The Siam Commercial Bank (SCB), in partnership with SCB 10X, is pleased to announce its collaboration with Lightnet to enhance cross-border payments and remittances, by using stablecoin for settlement on the public blockchain network. This groundbreaking project marks Thailand’s first use case of stablecoin for cross-border payments and remittances, setting a new standard for the financial services industry. With the integration of Fireblocks’ custody technology, the assets are secured at the back end, ensuring top-tier protection and trust between the parties.

This project has successfully graduated from the Bank of Thailand’s (BOT) regulatory sandbox in October 2024, the project is now fully commercialized, offering a transformative solution for cross-border transactions and marks a significant milestone in Thailand’s financial innovation.

This innovative solution provides numerous benefits, including better capital efficiency by enhancing management of funds through the elimination of pre-funding between partners, as well as reduced operational costs. Users can use local currencies for making transactions and experience improved reliability and availability, with the service accessible 24/7. Furthermore, the project leverages blockchain technology to create a truly global network for remittances.

“The collaboration between SCB and Lightnet underscores a commitment to pioneering financial innovation and improving the remittance experience for users. By integrating blockchain technology, the project promises a more efficient, reliable, and accessible solution for cross-border transactions.
By leveraging blockchain technology and stablecoins, we are making cross-border remittances more efficient, reliable, and accessible for everyone. SCB has a long-standing tradition of embracing innovative technologies to enhance our financial services. This latest collaboration with Lightnet and Fireblocks builds upon SCB’s history of pioneering fintech solutions. SCB’s consistent commitment to leveraging cutting-edge technology demonstrates our dedication to providing efficient, accessible financial services to our customers.” said Thanawatn Kittisuwan, First Executive Vice President & Head of Digital Juristic & Payment at SCB.

“At SCB 10X, our mission is to drive the adoption of financial technology innovation at SCB, SCBX Group and in the broader financial services industry. By harnessing blockchain technology, we are significantly enhancing the speed, efficiency, and accessibility of the international remittance transactions. This project showcases the real-world impact of fintech innovation, bringing substantial improvements to both the bank’s operations and our customers’ experiences. We are proud to have played a pivotal role in moving this initiative forward, coordinating efforts across teams to bring this transformative solution to life. We are thrilled about its potential to improve the efficiency of cross-border finance.” said Mukaya (Tai) Panich, CIO & CEO of SCB 10X.

“Lightnet is dedicated to develop the next generation universal financial network in order to solve various financial pain points for the customers. Our commitment is to provide individuals and businesses with financial access, financial mobility and efficiency. We believe that the launch of this revolutionary cross-border payments and remittance solution is the first step towards this goal. 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 the 24/7 basis. This project also promotes financial inclusion as there is a lower capital requirement per transaction. Beyond this, the project also provides unique value propositions to retail, corporate, and institutional clients and will help strengthen Thailand’s position as the ASEAN financial hub.” said Tridbodi Arunanondchai, Vice Chairman and Group CEO of Lightnet.

“We’re excited to be part of this groundbreaking initiative with SCB and Lightnet. This project demonstrates the transformative power of blockchain technology in revolutionizing traditional banking services, and showcases how financial institutions can leverage cutting-edge technology and a robust digital asset infrastructure to innovate and improve their services.” said Michael Shaulov, CEO and Co-founder of Fireblocks. “By providing our secure custody technology, Fireblocks is helping to ensure that cross-border transactions are not only faster and more efficient, but also meet the highest standards of security. We believe this project sets a new benchmark for the integration of stablecoins into mainstream banking services and look forward to seeing its impact on the way money moves across borders.

Building on this success, SCB and Lightnet are planning to extend the use case to corporate customers, facilitating both inward and outward remittances. This expansion aims to provide businesses with the same benefits enjoyed by retail customers, further revolutionizing the cross-border financial transactions.