Kraken’s parent Payward is betting billions on becoming financial infrastructure, not just a crypto exchange

But Payward is pursuing a different model than Coinbase, according to Architect Partners, a digital-assets investment bank. Rather than concentrating all of its products inside a single Kraken-branded platform, the company is building infrastructure that can support multiple brands and be used by outside financial companies.

“Payward appears to be choosing a different aggregation layer: the regulated infrastructure stack that can power financial products across multiple brands, customer segments, and partner channels,” Architect Partners said.

“In our view, Payward is helping define the next evolution beyond the ‘Everything Exchange’: an ‘Everything Financial Infrastructure’ model.”

Kraken remains smaller by exchange volume: CoinGecko data show it averaged about $1.1 billion in daily spot trading during the first four months of 2026, while Binance controlled 38.7% of top-10 centralized-exchange spot volume in the second quarter and Coinbase reported an 8.6% share of overall crypto trading volume in the first quarter.

One ledger, four businesses

Payward’s thesis is that much of the legacy financial system remains constrained by decades-old technology and market conventions. Securities take time to settle, markets close overnight and on weekends and banks, brokers, custodians and clearing houses maintain separate records that must be reconciled.

Each boundary creates another intermediary, delay and fee, Sethi said. Blockchain systems, in his view, offer an alternative by allowing assets to function as investments, collateral and programmable instruments on shared infrastructure.