Payward Inc., the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, has agreed to acquire Saldo Bank UAB, a specialized bank headquartered in Vilnius, Lithuania, the Financial Times (FT) reported on October 14, 2026. The transaction is expected to close in 2027, and financial terms were not disclosed. Neither Payward nor Saldo Bank has issued a formal statement on the reported agreement.
If completed, the purchase would give Payward direct ownership of a licensed lender that can take deposits and issue loans across the European Economic Area (EEA), the single market made up of the 27 European Union (EU) member states plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.
What Saldo Bank Brings to Payward
Saldo Bank holds a specialized bank license that the European Central Bank (ECB) granted on October 26, 2021. The license was issued on a proposal from the Bank of Lithuania, the country’s central bank and financial regulator, which announced the approval two days later. At the time, Saldo was the eighth institution to receive such a license.
Lithuania introduced the specialized bank regime in 2017. According to the Bank of Lithuania, these banks can accept deposits, grant loans, and provide money transfers and other standard banking services, but they cannot offer investment services.
In Lithuania, Saldo Bank offers unsecured consumer loans of up to €5,000 and business loans of up to €50,000 to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) without requiring collateral. It also offers term deposits to retail customers. Both lending products run on a fully automated approval system.
According to its audited 2025 financial statements, the bank serves customers in Lithuania, in Finland through a branch, and in Germany and Sweden without a branch. It does this through passporting, the EU mechanism that lets a bank authorized in one member state serve customers in others. During 2025, the bank secured additional passporting authorizations for lending in Germany and for both lending and deposits in the Netherlands.
The same filing shows how small the bank is:
- Total assets: €162.9 million at December 31, 2025, up from €133.6 million a year earlier
- Net profit: €962,000 in 2025, after a €2.4 million loss in 2024. The bank called this its first year of positive annual results, and it began banking operations in 2023.
- Loan book: nearly €124 million, up 19% year over year
- Total revenue: €28 million, up 24%
- Retail deposits: €136.9 million, with Germany the largest deposit market at about €50.5 million
- Capital: a Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) ratio of 14.9% and a total capital ratio of 19.8%. CET1 measures a bank’s highest-quality capital against its risk-weighted assets.
The bank had 86 employees at the end of 2025 and is wholly owned by Saldo Finance Oy, a Helsinki-based holding company. Its management report says its growth strategy relies on partnership-based and embedded banking. Embedded banking means delivering loans and deposits through other companies’ platforms. The bank launched its first such partnership, with Finland’s Vauraus, in early 2026.
From License Hunt to Acquisition
The deal follows months of signals about Payward’s plans for European banking.
On July 7, 2026, Kraken pursued a full banking license in Europe, focusing on Lithuania. The report cited a person familiar with the plans. Kraken declined to comment, and a Bank of Lithuania spokesperson said licensing processes are confidential. The same report listed Saldo Bank among the fintech firms that already held a banking license in Lithuania. Revolut followed a similar path when it obtained a specialized license from the Bank of Lithuania in 2018.
At the Money20/20 Europe conference, Payward co-chief executive Arjun Sethi said the company planned to spend the next decade collecting licenses in each region. It would do this either by buying existing businesses or by building new ones from scratch.
In a September 26, 2026 interview, Sethi said Payward was “about to buy a bank in Europe,” without naming the target. Bloomberg had reported in July that Payward was planning to buy a Lithuanian bank.
Why Owning a Bank Matters for Kraken
The acquisition reflects a pattern in how Payward expands: it buys businesses that already hold the licenses it needs instead of applying for each one itself.
In derivatives, Payward completed its acquisition of Bitnomial on May 4, 2026. The deal, valued at up to $550 million, was first announced in April. Bitnomial holds all three licenses needed to run a full derivatives business under the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the main US derivatives regulator: an exchange, a clearinghouse, and a futures broker license.
Payward also bought retail futures platform NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion in 2025. It added token management platform Magna in February 2026. On July 1, 2026, it completed its purchase of Reap, a Hong Kong-based stablecoin payments firm. That deal, worth up to $600 million, was announced in May. In December 2025, Kraken agreed to acquire Backed Finance, the issuer of the xStocks tokenized equities.
On the banking side, Payward has focused on round-the-clock dollar settlement for institutional clients. On September 3, 2026, it announced a partnership with SoFi to join the SoFi Exchange Network, a real-time settlement system. On October 5, it integrated SGB Net, a clearing network run by Bahrain-regulated Singapore Gulf Bank.
In the United States, the company’s banking unit is Kraken Financial, a Wyoming-chartered special purpose depository institution (SPDI). An SPDI is a state-chartered bank that must hold liquid assets at least equal to its customers’ deposits. On March 4, 2026, Kraken Financial received a limited-purpose master account from the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. This made it the first digital asset bank to gain direct access to Federal Reserve payment rails such as Fedwire. Payward has also applied for a national trust charter from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
Owning Saldo Bank would give Payward a regulated lender in the EEA that it controls. Payward would rely less on outside banking partners for euro-denominated services. The bank could also become the base for products such as loans secured by cryptocurrency holdings, though any such product would need regulatory approval.
The size gap between the two companies is wide. Kraken has about 6.6 million funded accounts and $40 billion to $50 billion in client assets, according to Sethi’s CoinDesk interview. Saldo Bank reported equity of €16.3 million. Payward’s main gain from the deal is the license and an operating bank in Europe, not Saldo’s balance sheet.
The IPO Backdrop
The deal comes as Payward prepares for a possible US stock market listing. The company confidentially submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on November 19, 2025. This is the first step toward an initial public offering (IPO).
Payward later paused those plans. On September 2, 2026, reporting indicated that the listing would not take place before the second quarter of 2027, citing people familiar with the matter and weak crypto market conditions.
A licensed EU bank would add deposits, credit, and payments to a business that still earns much of its revenue from crypto trading. It fits a broader expansion that also includes the company’s recent regulatory approval in Dubai.
What Happens Next
The transaction still needs regulatory clearance. Under the EU’s Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM), the ECB decides whether a buyer can take a significant stake in a euro area bank. It usually does so on a proposal from the national supervisor, which in this case is the Bank of Lithuania.
Saldo Bank’s 2025 report also notes that the Bank of Lithuania carried out a planned full-scope on-site inspection in the fourth quarter of 2025. When the report was published, the bank was preparing an action plan to address deficiencies identified in that inspection.
Key details are still unknown, including the purchase price, whether the Saldo brand will be kept, and when any new products might launch. Those are likely to come with a formal announcement from either company.
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