Kraken parent plans to offer tokenized IPO access as investors await SpaceX, Anthropic debut
Payward, Kraken’s parent company, plans to let eligible customers of Kraken and other xStocks Alliance members buy access to U.S.-listed IPOs through tokenized shares at the institutional IPO price. Investors will submit non-binding interest before a deal, demand will be aggregated across participating platforms, and allocations will be sought from underwriting syndicates. After listing, shares will be tokenized one-for-one against stock held by a regulated custodian and distributed through the platforms. The rollout is expected in the coming weeks and is aimed at expanding access to capital markets using blockchain-based tokenization. The model could reduce geographic and brokerage barriers, but IPO participation is not guaranteed and newly listed stocks can be volatile. Payward said it will only offer IPOs where it has secured allocations. The xStocks framework already supports tokenized equities and has processed over $30 billion in volume and more than $6 billion in onchain settlements.
