Kraken Parent Payward Plans Purchase of Lithuania's Saldo Bank in EU Banking Push

Payward, the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, is buying Lithuania-based Saldo Bank for an undisclosed sum to expand into lending and card issuing, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday. According to the Financial Times, the transaction makes Payward the first digital asset company to buy a bank in Europe, with the deal subject to regulatory approvals and expected to close in 2027. Saldo Bank secured its EU banking license in 2021 and provides consumer loans, business loans, and term deposits. The European banking move follows a wave of expansion for the San Francisco-based company, which previously acquired NinjaTrader before purchasing derivatives exchange Bitnomial for $550M in April and Asian stablecoin payments firm Reap Technologies for $600M in May. Meanwhile, Kraken reportedly pushed its planned IPO back to at least Q2 2027 after filing confidentially in November. In the US, Payward applied in May for a national trust company charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a license that permits holding customer assets and processing transactions but prohibits taking deposits. Earlier this month, the Independent Community Bankers of America sued the OCC over granting such charters to crypto firms like Coinbase $COIN and Ripple. "One of the biggest things that our customers have been asking us is 'I would like to get products and services and offerings similar to what I get with another bank,'" — Arjun Sethi, Co-CEO of Payward.