KB Kookmin Bank Extends Partnership with Bithumb for One Year

KB Kookmin Bank has agreed to extend its partnership with the cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb for an additional year.

According to the financial sector on September 7, Kookmin Bank and Bithumb have recently decided to extend their real-name account partnership and have applied for approval from the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU). Once the related procedures are completed, the partnership will be extended until the end of September next year.

As the existing contract is set to expire at the end of this month, Kookmin Bank has been discussing the renewal terms with Bithumb. In June, the bank conducted an on-site inspection of Bithumb, and has since been reviewing the results of the inspection and internal evaluations to consider the contract extension.

Particularly, interest in the renewal was heightened following a major Bitcoin overpayment incident at Bithumb earlier this year. However, it appears that Kookmin Bank has decided to maintain the partnership after assessing Bithumb's response and internal control systems following the incident.

The decision to renew the partnership is also believed to be influenced by the potential for expanding deposit bases and enhancing platform activity through the collaboration with Bithumb. As of the end of the first half of this year, Kookmin Bank's demand deposit balance stood at 176.8 trillion won, an increase of 25.3 trillion won compared to 151.5 trillion won at the end of 2024. During the same period, the monthly active users (MAU) of Kookmin Bank's mobile app, KB Star Banking, rose from 13.03 million to 14.06 million.