Crypto Exchanges
By Sakamoto Nashi
1 / 15
What Kraken Gets From the Deal. Kraken can now compete directly with Coinbase and CME Group in the U.S. derivatives market.
2 / 15
Why Buying Beats Building. Building a CFTC-compliant derivatives business from scratch takes forever.
3 / 15
Payward just closed a big deal. The company owns Kraken, and it paid up to $550 million to buy Bitnomial. Why does that matter?
4 / 15
The licenses in question are a Designated Contract Market license, a Derivatives Clearing Organization license, and a Futures Commission Merchant license.
5 / 15
Payward Services is Kraken's B2B platform. It lets fintechs, banks, and brokerages plug into Kraken's infrastructure through a single API.
6 / 15
The acquisition also values Payward's equity at around $20 billion. That's not a public filing, but it's the number floating around based on the deal structure.
7 / 15
Building a CFTC-compliant derivatives business from scratch takes forever. You need approvals for each license, and the process involves mountains of paperwork, audits, and…
8 / 15
And Bitnomial's infrastructure is crypto-native. The platform introduced the first U.S. perpetual futures and CFTC-regulated crypto margin collateral.
9 / 15
More context: CFTC Chief Backs Prediction Markets as Trading Hits $6.5 Billion
10 / 15
Kraken's move reflects a broader trend in the industry. When regulatory compliance becomes a competitive advantage, buying existing licenses can be faster than building them.
11 / 15
The deal also strengthens Kraken's position with institutional clients. Banks and asset managers want regulated products.
12 / 15
Bitnomial's integration into Payward Services is probably the most underrated part of the deal.
13 / 15
The acquisition also sidesteps a lot of risk. Building a derivatives platform from scratch means you might get halfway through the process and hit a regulatory roadblock.
14 / 15
See also: Anne Le Hénanff Supports Crypto at the Louvre Carousel with 100 Million Euros
15 / 15
Kraken's competitors will need to respond. Coinbase has its own derivatives offerings, and CME Group dominates traditional crypto futures.
The Currency Analytics
Want the full story?