Payward to Buy Bitnomial for Up to $550M, Gains US Licenses

Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, agreed to acquire Chicago-based Bitnomial for up to $550 million in cash and stock. The transaction values Payward’s equity at about $20 billion and is expected to close in the first half of 2026, subject to Commodity Futures Trading Commission approval and customary closing conditions.

Bitnomial holds the three CFTC authorizations needed to operate a full U.S. digital-asset derivatives business: a designated contract market, a derivatives clearing organization and a futures commission merchant. The firm has built a crypto-native derivatives platform in Chicago and has listed products including perpetual futures, CFTC-regulated crypto margin collateral and native crypto settlement. Bitnomial was the first U.S. platform to list regulated futures for some assets, including XRP futures and physically settled Solana futures.

Payward plans to use Bitnomial’s licensed infrastructure to offer U.S. derivatives under CFTC oversight. The company intends to launch spot margin trading, perpetuals and options in the U.S. market and to integrate those products into Payward Services, its business-to-business platform. Through that single integration, banks, brokerages, fintech firms and payment providers will be able to access regulated derivatives alongside crypto trading, tokenized equities, staking and fiat on- and off-ramps.

The acquisition follows several recent purchases as Payward expands beyond retail crypto trading. In the past year the firm bought TradFi derivatives platform NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion and acquired a tokenization platform tied to a tokenized equity product. Payward already operates regulated derivatives businesses in the U.K. and European Union following a 2019 acquisition of a licensed crypto futures platform in Britain and an EU derivatives launch in 2025.

The companies said Bitnomial’s licensing work took more than a decade and provides an integrated clearing and trading setup that Payward expects to use to build a unified order book across spot, futures, options and perpetuals. Bitnomial’s Chicago headquarters places its operations near the U.S. derivatives trading and clearing hub.

If the CFTC approves the transaction, Payward intends to fold Bitnomial’s regulated entities into its U.S. product roadmap and offer regulated derivatives to third parties through Payward Services. The deal remains subject to regulatory review and standard closing requirements.

Days before the announcement, Deutsche Börse disclosed a secondary-market purchase of Payward shares, acquiring a roughly 1.5% fully diluted stake for about $200 million. Payward spent much of the past year preparing for a possible public listing while expanding its product and regulatory footprint.

Arjun Sethi, co‑CEO of Payward and Kraken, described plans to deploy Bitnomial’s licenses and technology to launch U.S. derivatives and to expand third‑party access through Payward Services. Bitnomial founder and CEO Luke Hoersten pointed to the firm’s record of early listings and the decade-long effort to assemble its licensing stack.