Payward Inc., the parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, has agreed to acquire Hong Kong-based Reap Technologies Holdings in a deal worth up to $600 million in cash and stock. The transaction values Payward at $20 billion and is expected to close in the second half of 2026, according to the company’s announcement.
The acquisition marks another step in Payward’s effort to build a broader financial infrastructure platform around digital assets, stablecoins, and institutional services. By bringing Reap into its ecosystem, the company is adding payment capabilities that go beyond trading and custody, extending into card issuance, cross-border payouts, and treasury tools for businesses operating internationally.
Why Reap matters to Payward
Reap has built a platform that connects traditional financial rails, including banking systems and card networks, with stablecoin settlement through a single API. Its products support corporate card issuing, cross-border disbursements, and treasury management, particularly for businesses with footprints across Asia, South America, and other international markets.
For Payward, that fills a strategic gap. Its B2B unit, Payward Services, already provides a single integration layer for crypto trading, custody, tokenized assets, on- and off-ramps, and derivatives. Reap expands that offering into day-to-day payment infrastructure, giving enterprise partners a way to plug card and payments functionality into a broader crypto-native financial stack.
Rather than forcing customers to work with multiple providers for settlement, issuance, custody, and liquidity, the combined platform is intended to offer a more unified setup. In practical terms, that means Payward Services clients could eventually embed stablecoin-based payment tools alongside existing exchange and custody functions.
Stablecoin cards are becoming a larger market
Reap Co-Founder and CEO Daren Guo said the global stablecoin and crypto card market now exceeds $18 billion annually. He also said Reap nearly tripled revenue and volumes in 2025, while expanding its licensing footprint from Asia into South America. Those figures suggest that stablecoin-linked cards are moving from a niche crypto product toward a more meaningful segment of global payment infrastructure.
The business case is straightforward: stablecoins can offer faster settlement, lower friction in international transfers, and more flexibility for companies that need to move money across jurisdictions. As adoption rises in treasury management and business payments, providers with both regulated financial access and crypto-native infrastructure may be better positioned to capture that flow.
Guo described the transaction as a way to connect stablecoin cards to a wider set of crypto-native financial services. That framing highlights the broader trend in the sector: companies are no longer focused only on digital asset trading, but on embedding stablecoins into practical financial operations such as payroll, supplier payments, treasury routing, and card issuance.
Payward’s broader infrastructure strategy
Payward Co-CEO Arjun Sethi characterized stablecoins as the settlement substrate for a financial system moving toward programmable money and autonomous execution. His comments reflect a growing industry view that stablecoins are evolving into foundational rails for internet-native finance rather than simply acting as trading pairs on exchanges.
Sethi also pointed to milestones on Payward’s platform, including Krak launching across 110 countries on day one and xStocks surpassing $29 billion in cumulative volume in its first year. Those numbers were cited to show that the company already has a large-scale distribution and liquidity framework in place, which could become more valuable if paired with payment tools like those Reap provides.
Payward said it operates on a shared architecture that includes one global liquidity pool, one unified risk and margin engine, one collateral and settlement system, and one compliance and licensing framework. Acquiring specialized businesses appears to be a central part of that strategy. The company has also recently acquired NinjaTrader, Bitnomial, and Backed, signaling an ongoing push to add targeted capabilities rather than building every piece internally.
Reap will remain a standalone platform
Despite the acquisition, Reap is expected to continue operating as a standalone platform under Guo’s leadership. It will retain its brand and go-to-market approach, while gaining access to Payward’s global liquidity, custody, settlement infrastructure, and regulatory licenses in the United States and the European Union.
That structure may help Payward preserve Reap’s existing business momentum while still integrating key backend advantages. For customers, the arrangement could offer continuity in product and market strategy while gradually broadening the services available through the platform.
The regulatory angle is also important. Reap’s current licenses in the Asia-Pacific region support Payward’s expansion across APAC and the Americas. In the other direction, Payward’s regulatory permissions in the U.S. and EU could open new corridors for Reap in Europe and North America. Together, the two companies said they plan to extend stablecoin-powered payment infrastructure into high-growth regions including the Middle East, North Africa, and Latin America.
A bet on unified crypto-financial services
Reap is also a participant in the Global Dollar Network, further connecting it to stablecoin settlement infrastructure. That participation adds another layer to the strategic fit, especially as firms increasingly seek interoperable rails that can link cards, banking access, treasury management, and digital dollar settlement.
The larger significance of the deal is that it shows how exchange operators are expanding beyond market access into full-service financial infrastructure. Stablecoin adoption in business payments and treasury management has been climbing, and companies like Payward appear to be responding by trying to control more of the underlying stack.
If the deal closes as planned in the second half of 2026, Payward will be better positioned to offer partners an integrated product suite spanning trading, custody, tokenized assets, card issuance, cross-border payments, and stablecoin treasury services. In a market where fragmentation remains a major pain point, that kind of one-stop infrastructure could become a meaningful competitive advantage.
For now, the transaction stands as another strong signal that stablecoins are increasingly being treated not just as crypto instruments, but as core plumbing for the next generation of global payments.