Kraken parent company Payward added more than 200 tokenized British and European shares to its xStocks platform on Wednesday, pushing the platform past $1.1 billion in assets under management and 1,500 total assets, according to CoinDesk. The expansion gives eligible crypto investors in 110 markets 24/7 price exposure to major European companies like SAP, Siemens, Shell and LVMH through self-custody crypto wallets, though investors in the United Kingdom and the United States are still blocked from buying them.
The new batch includes all 40 companies in Germany’s benchmark DAX index, among them insurer Allianz and telecommunications group Deutsche Telekom. Payward launched xStocks in June 2025 with a focus on U.S. equities and ETFs, and Wednesday’s additions mark the first rollout under a July partnership with investment firm GTN, which handles trade execution and custody of the underlying shares.
With the European rollout, xStocks has recorded more than $45 billion in cumulative transaction volume across over 550,000 unique holders, Cointelegraph reported. Data from Token Terminal puts xStocks’ market capitalization at $1.1 billion, or roughly 22% of the $4.9 billion in tokenized stocks tracked by the firm. Rival Binance’s bStocks currently leads the sector with $1.4 billion in tokenized stock value.
“Access to capital markets is still drawn on a map, and it still depends on holding the right passport. A portfolio should not have borders or trading hours. We are building toward a single global market where any listed company can be held by any investor, whatever their address, their currency, or their local broker. Over 200 UK and European listings onchain today is proof it works. Tokenizing every other international market is the next step,” Mark Greenberg, Chief Commercial Officer at Payward, said in Wednesday’s release, as reported by FinTech Global.
How xStocks tokens work and where they trade
Each xStocks token tracks a single stock and is backed one-to-one by real shares held with a regulated custodian. Buyers do not receive direct legal ownership of the underlying company; instead, the tokens are share-backed certificates that provide synthetic exposure to the stock’s price. Since August, eligible holders of supported tokens have been able to submit proxy voting preferences through Broadridge, and the value of any dividends is automatically reinvested into additional tokens rather than paid out in cash.
Investors in supported jurisdictions can buy the tokens through Kraken, participating xStocks Alliance platforms, or Deutsche Börse’s affiliated 360X trading venue. Deutsche Börse announced in a separate statement on Wednesday that the DAX 40 and newly added European tokens are now live for trading on 360X.
“Tokenisation moves at the speed of the infrastructure beneath it. By combining GTN’s global brokerage and custody infrastructure with the xStocks framework, we are bringing UK- and EU-listed equities to a broader global audience. We believe the future of investing will be defined by greater accessibility, interoperability, and efficiency, and this partnership demonstrates how traditional and digital financial ecosystems can work together to deliver that future at scale,” said Ankit Shah, Global Head of FinTech at GTN.
Why US and UK investors are excluded
Even with British companies now on the platform, residents of both the U.K. and the U.S. remain excluded due to local securities and distribution rules. In the U.S., the Securities and Exchange Commission’s innovation exemption for tokenized securities venues requires tokens to grant holders the exact same legal rights and privileges as traditional shares of an equivalent class. That rule explicitly excludes third-party certificates that offer synthetic price exposure like xStocks.
Rival exchanges are structuring their products differently to meet that U.S. standard. OKX and New York Stock Exchange parent Intercontinental Exchange are planning a joint venture called OKXICE designed to give token holders direct share rights under the SEC framework.
Wednesday’s launch follows a September agreement between Payward and the London Stock Exchange to tokenize the LSE’s 100 largest listed companies. The London Stock Exchange plans to list xStocks on its LSE 24 platform in 2027, pending regulatory approval, while Payward plans to add hundreds of Hong Kong-listed stocks to xStocks in the coming weeks.