Payward Inc., the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, and asset management giant Franklin Templeton announced a strategic collaboration on May 12 to build tokenized investment products and expand onchain financial infrastructure. Franklin Templeton manages approximately $1.74 trillion in assets, while Payward's xStocks tokenized equities framework has processed over $30 billion in trading volume since its 2025 launch.
Core of the Deal: Actively Managed Strategies Onchain
The partnership plans to deploy actively managed investment products directly on blockchain networks, making traditional asset manager strategies programmable and tradeable onchain. The two firms will also co-design tokenized yield products, initially targeting institutional clients and, where regulations permit, Kraken's broader user base. These products emphasize transparency, programmability, and flexibility.
BENJI Token Integration Expands Onchain Capital Use
Kraken will integrate Franklin Templeton's BENJI token suite for institutional use. BENJI tokens represent shares in the Franklin Onchain U.S. Government Money Fund (FOBXX) and can be used as collateral or to generate yield in digital markets. This integration gives institutional capital richer onchain utility.
Executive Take: Credibility Meets Programmability
Arjun Sethi, co-CEO of Payward and Kraken, said: "What collaborations like this one unlock is a new class of products that wouldn't have been possible even three years ago: assets that carry the credibility of multi-decade managers and the programmability of digital infrastructure." Sandy Kaul, head of digital assets and innovation at Franklin Templeton, added: "By expanding the utility of BENJI and exploring new tokenized products, our work with Payward reflects the growing need to serve both digital-native and institutional customers with solutions built for how capital increasingly moves onchain."
Franklin Templeton's Blockchain Journey of Nearly Six Years
Franklin Templeton has pursued blockchain integration since 2018. In April 2021, it launched FOBXX, the first U.S.-registered mutual fund to record share ownership on a public blockchain. The fund now operates across Stellar, Solana, Base, Polygon, Aptos, Arbitrum, Avalanche, and other networks. In March 2026, the firm partnered with Ondo Finance to tokenize five ETFs; the following month, it launched its Franklin Crypto unit through the acquisition of 250 Digital, a CoinFund spinoff, with part of the deal settled using BENJI tokens.
xStocks Framework and Nasdaq Deep Collaboration
Payward's xStocks framework offers tokenized 1:1 representations of U.S. stocks and ETFs for eligible non-U.S. clients, enabling extended trading hours and DeFi composability including lending and DEX trading. Earlier in 2026, it announced a partnership with Nasdaq to develop specialty equity token designs supporting automated corporate actions, proxy voting, and dividend distribution.
Risk disclosures note regulatory uncertainty, blockchain security vulnerabilities, and pricing/settlement accuracy. Tokenized products are issued and distributed by Payward; Franklin Templeton manages underlying strategies but does not issue or endorse tokenization platforms. Availability varies by jurisdiction. Both firms participate in DTCC tokenization working groups, positioning the partnership as a leading integration of traditional finance and crypto-native infrastructure.