Payward, the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, is broadening its tokenized stock offering to include equities from Hong Kong, the United Kingdom and South Korea, marking a significant step beyond its initial focus on U.S. markets.
Going Global With Tokenized Equities
The move extends Payward's xStocks platform, which lets users trade blockchain-based representations of traditional shares, into three major international markets. Until now, the product had centered largely on American stocks, but the latest expansion signals an ambition to mirror a far wider slice of the world's equity landscape onchain.
By tokenizing stocks from Hong Kong, the UK and South Korea, the company is aiming to give investors around-the-clock access to shares that would otherwise be constrained by regional trading hours and geographic barriers. Tokenized equities are designed to track the price of underlying stocks while settling on public blockchains.
The race to put the world's stock markets onchain is accelerating, and the map is expanding fast.
Rising Competition in the Space
Payward's expansion arrives as competition intensifies among firms seeking to bring conventional financial assets onto blockchain rails. Tokenization has emerged as one of the most closely watched trends in crypto, with proponents arguing it can lower costs, speed up settlement and open markets to a broader base of global participants.
The appeal for exchanges and issuers is clear: tokenized stocks can be traded outside traditional market hours and potentially settled almost instantly, offering an alternative to legacy clearing systems. That has drawn interest from both crypto-native platforms and established financial players.
Key aspects of the broader tokenization push include:
- Extending trading access beyond standard market hours
- Reducing friction for cross-border investors
- Bringing traditional assets onto blockchain infrastructure
As more providers move to tokenize international equities, the competition to build the deepest and most liquid onchain markets is likely to sharpen, with firms racing to add coverage across additional regions and asset classes.