Nasdaq Pours $100M into Crypto Exchange Kraken's Parent

Nasdaq is investing $100 million in Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken. The deal will help build out structure for tokenized stocks and values Payward at $21 billion. This investment comes as Wall Street increasingly eyes up bitcoin and crypto-related infrastructure.

Kraken has made deals with traditional finance firms this year and last, including a March partnership with S&P Dow Jones Indices to debut a new derivative contract on decentralized exchange Hyperliquid. The company will distribute Nasdaq's tokenized stocks on its platform, giving customers the ability to own Nasdaq-listed stocks in a tokenized form.

The investment from Nasdaq highlights Wall Street's growing interest in tokenizing assets like stocks and bonds. The New York Stock Exchange has been building a platform for buying and selling tokenized versions of US-listed equities and exchange-traded funds, with plans to settle trades on the blockchain 24/7.