Kraken Owner Payward to Tokenize 100 London Stock Exchange Shares

Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, has announced plans to tokenize 100 stocks listed on the London Stock Exchange, extending its xStocks product into one of Europe's largest equity markets.

The tokenized shares are intended to trade on a platform called LSE 24, according to Payward, though the plan remains subject to regulatory approval before it can move forward.

xStocks is Payward's brand for tokenized equities, digital representations of shares that can be traded on blockchain-based infrastructure. The move to bring London-listed names into that framework would mark an expansion of the product into UK equities, an area where regulatory clarity around tokenized securities has been closely watched by market participants.

What is known so far

Payward has not detailed which 100 companies from the London Stock Exchange would be included in the initial tokenization batch, nor has it set out a timeline for when LSE 24 might begin supporting trading. The company has confirmed only that the plan hinges on securing the necessary regulatory sign-off.

Kraken, the crypto exchange operated under Payward, has in recent periods pushed to broaden its offerings beyond digital assets and into tokenized traditional securities, a category that has drawn growing interest from both crypto-native firms and established financial institutions.

For European investors and market watchers, the London Stock Exchange's involvement, even indirectly through a linked platform such as LSE 24, would represent a notable step in bringing tokenized equities closer to mainstream capital markets infrastructure in the region.

Regulatory hurdle remains

No regulator has yet approved the plan, and Payward's announcement frames the initiative explicitly as contingent on that approval being granted. Until then, the scope, structure and launch date of the tokenized LSE offering remain undefined.

The announcement adds London to the list of markets where Payward has signalled ambitions to extend its xStocks tokenization model, following the company's broader push to link crypto exchange infrastructure with traditional equity markets.