London Stock Exchange Partners With Kraken Parent to Bring Top 100 UK Stocks to Tokenized xStocks

The London Stock Exchange is partnering with Payward, the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, to bring shares of the 100 largest companies listed on the exchange into Payward’s xStocks tokenization framework.

The partnership could eventually connect tokenized versions of major UK-listed equities with the London Stock Exchange’s planned 24-hour trading platform, marking another step toward integrating blockchain-based securities with traditional capital markets.

Payward and the London Stock Exchange announced Tuesday that the first batch of UK-listed equities will become available as xStocks in the coming weeks. The expansion comes as the tokenized-equity platform continues to grow, with cumulative trading volume now exceeding $40 billion.

Around $20 billion of that activity has been settled directly on blockchain networks, while the products have attracted more than 200,000 holders, according to Payward.

Top 100 London-listed companies to enter xStocks

Under the agreement, shares of the 100 largest companies listed on the London Stock Exchange will be incorporated into Payward’s xStocks framework.

Each xStock is backed on a 1:1 basis by its corresponding underlying security. The blockchain-based products can trade around the clock on supported centralized platforms and can also be transferred to self-custody wallets and used with compatible blockchain applications.

The planned UK expansion will give eligible investors in more than 110 countries access to tokenized representations of UK-listed companies. Investors based in the UK, however, are currently excluded from accessing xStocks.

The deal forms part of Payward’s broader effort to expand xStocks beyond US-listed equities and establish a tokenized-equity offering spanning major international markets.

xStocks accelerates international expansion

The partnership follows a rapid international expansion for xStocks.

In July, Payward partnered with financial infrastructure provider GTN to broaden the platform’s global reach, initially targeting Hong Kong-listed securities before expanding into markets including the UK, Europe and South Korea.

Under that arrangement, GTN agreed to provide execution, custody and recordkeeping infrastructure across more than 90 international financial markets. At the time, xStocks supported more than 500 tokenized assets and had surpassed $37 billion in transaction volume.

Activity has continued to climb since then. By Aug. 18, xStocks transaction volume had exceeded $38 billion, coinciding with Kraken's rollout of access to 7,000 US-listed stocks for eligible customers across the European Economic Area.

The service allows customers to trade conventional US equities alongside more than 700 xStocks and over 600 digital assets within a single Kraken account.

Traditional stock trading in the EEA is provided through Payward Europe Digital Solutions (CY) Limited, a Cyprus investment firm regulated under the European Union’s MiFID II framework.

Payward said in announcing the London Stock Exchange partnership that xStocks has now surpassed $40 billion in cumulative transaction volume, with roughly half of that activity settled directly on blockchain networks.

London Stock Exchange prepares for 24-hour trading

The agreement goes beyond simply adding UK equities to Payward’s existing tokenization platform.

It also aligns with the London Stock Exchange’s plans to extend trading beyond conventional market hours.

Subject to regulatory approval, the exchange plans to list xStocks and support their trading through LSE 24, a proposed around-the-clock trading platform unveiled by the exchange.

The platform is expected to eventually encompass tokenized equities from the US, European Union, UK and Hong Kong, with the possibility of adding other asset classes as the framework develops.

The London Stock Exchange has been preparing to expand access to markets outside the traditional London trading session.

In July, reports indicated that the exchange was developing a separate overnight market targeted for launch in the first half of 2027. Early plans included exchange-traded products linked to UK and US equity markets.

London Stock Exchange Chief Executive Julia Hoggett said at the time that retail investors had shown interest in using London-based trading hours to gain access to both domestic and international assets.

Tokenized securities move closer to traditional markets

The Payward agreement would add tokenized securities to the exchange’s broader plans for extended-hours trading, although any listing remains subject to regulatory approval.

Payward Co-CEO Arjun Sethi described the partnership as a combination of regulated financial markets and blockchain infrastructure.

For years, he said, crypto and traditional finance had been viewed as competing systems in which one would ultimately displace the other. The emerging model, he argued, suggests that the two can instead operate together.

Hoggett, meanwhile, struck a more cautious tone on the development of tokenized markets, emphasizing the importance of maintaining investor protections and the integrity of regulated financial markets.

Her position reflects a broader challenge facing the tokenization industry: bringing blockchain-based financial products into established market infrastructure without weakening the regulatory protections built around conventional securities.

London Stock Exchange explores native blockchain shares

The partnership could also extend beyond tokenizing existing securities.

Payward and the London Stock Exchange said they will explore the potential issuance of LSE-native tokenized shares. Such a model could eventually allow exchange members to issue and service securities directly on blockchain infrastructure.

Under the proposed structure, blockchain-native securities would be fully fungible with their conventional counterparts and would carry the same economic and shareholder rights.

That approach would differ from the existing xStocks model. Today, xStocks are issued against corresponding securities held within the product’s underlying custody structure.

A native issuance model, by contrast, would move the creation and servicing of the security itself onto blockchain infrastructure.

xStocks expands beyond trading into collateral

Payward is also looking to expand the role of tokenized equities beyond spot trading.

In July, Kraken began allowing eligible customers outside the US to use selected xStocks as collateral for futures and margin trading on Kraken Pro.

The initial list included 10 assets, including tokenized versions of shares in Apple, Nvidia, Tesla, Strategy, Robinhood and Alphabet, as well as several major exchange-traded funds.

Futures collateral became available to eligible customers outside the US, including those in the EEA. Margin-trading collateral was made available to eligible users outside the US, with EEA customers excluded from that particular offering.

Kraken applies different collateral haircuts and limits depending on the underlying asset. Tokenized versions of broad-market ETFs such as SPY and QQQ received a 10% haircut at launch, while many individual equities were subject to 20% haircuts, with higher discounts applied to more volatile securities.

The model allows eligible investors to retain their tokenized equity positions while using those assets to support other financial positions, potentially reducing the need to sell the underlying exposure to raise collateral.

From tokenized trading to a new financial layer

Tokenized equities are increasingly moving beyond crypto-native platforms and into infrastructure connected to established financial institutions.

The London Stock Exchange partnership places xStocks closer to regulated exchange infrastructure, while the two companies’ exploration of native digital shares could take blockchain integration one step further by moving the issuance process itself onto distributed networks.

The distinction between tokenized equities and conventional brokerage holdings is particularly important when it comes to transferability.

Traditional shares remain within established brokerage, settlement and custody systems, operating according to conventional market schedules. Tokenized securities, where permitted, can instead be transferred between compatible wallets and interacted with through blockchain-based applications outside traditional trading hours.

Payward’s broader vision is to make tokenized assets usable across centralized exchanges, self-custody environments and blockchain-based financial applications while maintaining a link to the underlying securities.

London deal strengthens Payward’s global strategy

The London Stock Exchange agreement represents another stage in Payward’s rapid expansion of xStocks during 2026.

Its partnership with GTN laid the infrastructure for bringing tokenized securities from multiple major equity markets onto the platform, while Kraken’s EEA rollout connected thousands of conventional US stocks with hundreds of xStocks within a regulated account environment.

Adding major UK-listed companies would extend that model into one of the world’s largest established equity markets.

If regulatory approvals are secured, tokenized versions of those securities could eventually become accessible through LSE 24, potentially bringing blockchain-based equities into an exchange environment designed to operate beyond conventional market hours.

At the same time, the expansion of xStocks into collateral markets illustrates a broader shift in how tokenized securities could be used. Rather than serving solely as digital representations of stocks for trading purposes, they could become components of wider financial infrastructure, supporting lending, margin and derivatives positions.

Neither Payward nor the London Stock Exchange provided a specific launch date for the first UK xStocks, saying only that they are expected to become available in the coming weeks.

The companies also did not provide a timetable for potential native blockchain securities issued through the London Stock Exchange, describing that part of the partnership as an area for further exploration.

Could tokenized equities become part of mainstream capital markets?

The Payward-London Stock Exchange partnership highlights how tokenization is gradually moving from the margins of digital-asset markets toward the core infrastructure of traditional finance.

The significance of tokenized equities may ultimately extend beyond the ability to trade shares around the clock. Their potential to move between compatible wallets, interact with blockchain-based applications and serve as collateral could create a more flexible layer of financial infrastructure around traditionally less mobile assets.

But bringing that model into mainstream capital markets will require regulators and market operators to address fundamental questions around ownership, custody, settlement, investor protection and interoperability.

If those challenges can be resolved, the London Stock Exchange’s partnership with Payward could prove to be more than an expansion of an existing tokenized-stock platform. It could become part of a broader transition in which blockchain infrastructure is integrated directly into the machinery of global capital markets rather than operating alongside it.