Payward, the parent organization of Kraken, is expanding its xStocks network by integrating over 200 British and European equities, granting qualified cryptocurrency traders exposure to equities from several of the continent’s major corporations.
This expansion incorporates every single one of the 40 firms listed on Germany’s DAX index, such as tech giant SAP, manufacturing conglomerate Siemens, and financial services provider Allianz, thereby broadening the platform’s scope beyond the tokenized American equities that initially anchored the xStocks portfolio.
Every digital token mirrors a specific equity and is fully supported by shares maintained through a licensed custodian. Financial services provider GTN manages order execution and safekeeping, whereas participants can acquire the digital units via Kraken or collaborative networks and hold them within digital cryptocurrency wallets.
Payward reported that total assets under management for xStocks have now exceeded $1.1 billion. Even with the introduction of European and British enterprises, these assets remain restricted from participants residing in the United States and the United Kingdom.
This growth builds upon a September partnership with the London Stock Exchange aimed at bringing its 100 premier publicly traded companies onto the blockchain. Marketplace activity on the LSE 24 system is targeted for 2027, subject to official regulatory clearance.
Furthermore, Payward intends to introduce hundreds of equities traded in Hong Kong during the upcoming weeks.
These xStocks function as equity-backed certificates that deliver derivative exposure to stock valuations, omitting any legal ownership of the underlying corporations. Nevertheless, since August, qualifying owners of eligible digital assets have possessed the ability to submit proxy voting preferences via Broadrridge, while dividend proceeds are automatically rolled over into extra tokens instead of being distributed as monetary cash.
Such a framework contrasts with the approach proposed by OKXICE, a collaborative enterprise involving OKX and Intercontinental Exchange, the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange. The regulatory framework established by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission via its innovation exemption for digital asset trading platforms mandates that such tokens must grant owners identical legal entitlements and benefits as standard shares of a corresponding category.
Moreover, this regulatory waiver specifically leaves out digital units created by an independent entity as an autonomous financial instrument that provides synthetic equity exposure.
Originally published at https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/11/11/kraken-s-xstocks-adds-200-uk-and-eu-shares-as-its-assets-top-usd1-1-billion.
