ChainCatcher news, according to CoinDesk, people familiar with the matter revealed that custodial banking giant BNY is negotiating with Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, for a broad cooperation covering digital assets and financial market infrastructure. Potential agreements could involve areas such as crypto products, custody, wealth management, trading, payments and infrastructure, with related services provided through Payward Services, a platform for banks, exchanges and asset managers.
Parts of the proposed collaboration could be similar to the infrastructure portion of Payward's recent deal with Nasdaq, one of the people said. Negotiations are ongoing and there is no guarantee a deal will be reached, and both Payward and BNY declined to comment. BNY, formerly known as Bank of New York Mellon, provides custody, asset servicing, clearing and wealth management services to institutional clients, and has been developing tokenized deposits to support near-real-time on-chain settlement between institutional market participants.
The agreement with BNY will further promote Payward’s integration of digital asset business with traditional financial institutions. Last month Nasdaq Ventures agreed to invest $100 million in Payward at a $21 billion valuation and expand their collaboration on tokenized shares. Under the agreement, the two parties will continue to develop the operational and commercial infrastructure for Nasdaq stock tokens. Payward will also adopt Nasdaq's market monitoring technology in its crypto, stock, tokenized stock, futures and options trading venues. The two parties expect to launch Nasdaq stock tokens in the second quarter of 2027.