Kraken is one of the most trusted names in crypto

Kraken Financial is a Special Purpose Depository Institution (SPDI) chartered and headquartered in Wyoming, USA. Pursuant to Wyoming law, an SPDI is a bank that receives deposits and conducts other incidental banking activities, including custody, asset servicing, asset management, and other banking services. 

Kraken Financial is building the bridge between traditional finance and digital assets. It will provide many of the elements clients expect from a traditional bank with connectivity to the digital asset ecosystem, furthering Kraken’s mission to accelerate the global adoption of digital assets so that everyone can achieve financial freedom and inclusion. 

The charter for Kraken Financial enables it to serve clients with the safety and security they expect from a regulated financial institution. Kraken Financial is proudly built on a foundation of industry-leading security practices and attentive client service. 

Deposits at Kraken Financial are not insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). However, Wyoming law requires all fiat deposits held by an SPDI to be fully reserved.

Kraken Financial is required — at all times — to have client deposits of currency (only fiat and not digital assets) backed by 100% or more of USD cash and/or high-quality liquid assets. This means that fiat deposits will be held in cash or invested in the least risky, most liquid cash equivalents.

Kraken Financial services institutional clients in certain U.S. states, the UK and Australia with more on the way. Eligible institutions may be able to obtain fiat deposit accounts and participate in our qualified custody solution for digital assets.

We offer digital asset custody, fiat deposit accounts and integrated OTC trading  for institutional clients. All services are fully online and we provide 24/7/365 client support.

We launched in March 2024.

Yes. Kraken Financial is subject to supervision and examination by the Wyoming Division of Banking. The Wyoming State Banking Board granted Kraken Financial an SPDI bank charter in 2020.

No, Kraken Financial will serve all clients via its online portal. Client support services will be available 24/7/365.

After creating a relationship with Kraken, institutional clients will have an opportunity to apply for an account at Kraken Financial. Kraken Financial will be expanding its product offerings in the future and we will provide additional information as it becomes available.

In the meantime, you can visit to create your Kraken trading account if you don’t have one yet.

Kraken Financial assets are completely segregated from Kraken exchange assets. Each entity maintains separate accounts to hold their respective digital and fiat assets. Client digital assets held in custody are segregated from both Kraken Financial’s assets as well as the Kraken exchange assets.

Kraken Financial is a wholly owned subsidiary of Payward Inc. (dba Kraken). Kraken Financial is led by a board of directors and a senior management team with experience in digital assets and traditional finance.

Some institutional clients are required to maintain assets with a “qualified custodian.” Kraken Financial is a state-chartered, regulated bank in Wyoming and also meets the definition of a qualified custodian under the Custody Rule of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Only certain entities are eligible to serve as qualified custodians.

All digital assets held in custody by Kraken Financial are held through a proprietary solution which utilizes hardware security modules (HSM) and multiple layers of security.

Multi-party computation (MPC) is a modern cryptography technique to generate a set of private key shares without needing to re-assemble the key material in one place. MPC mitigates the risk of a single point of failure.

Kraken Financial’s custody product uses a combination of specialized hardware to generate the private keys and a layer of MPC on top to safely distribute permissions to perform actions on those private keys.

Currently, our custody solution supports BTC, ETH and USDC (ERC-20). Support for additional assets will be considered on an ongoing basis.

This varies and depends on several factors related to the particular blockchain, block confirmation times, safety of confirmed block depth and other considerations.

Kraken Financial clients will be given authorized access to their own custody vaults where they can manage their digital assets through a separate user interface. Custody vaults are only available via the web, and clients will establish two-factor authentication (2FA) and approval quorums during the onboarding process.

Institutions can trade assets through the Kraken OTC desk via our integrated OTC trading feature. Clients must be onboarded with Kraken OTC in order for the request-for-quote (RFQ) feature to be activated in Kraken Custody.

We do not currently offer staking services. Custody clients can withdraw assets to the Kraken exchange to gain access to Kraken Institutional’s full suite of products and services.

APIs are not currently available for managing digital assets held in custody with Kraken Financial.

Kraken Financial’s custody product will initially only be available via a web browser with a user interface that is optimized for desktop.

Yes. Kraken Financial is required to undergo audits regularly, and will produce annual audited financial statements. In addition to audits, Kraken Financial is subject to safety and soundness examinations by the Wyoming Division of Banking. 

Digital assets are held in your name in your own custodial account and can be verified on the blockchain. In the unlikely event that Kraken Financial experiences distress or fails, the Commissioner of the Wyoming Division of Banking may take certain steps to protect customers, including administering a liquidation proceeding to resolve the institution’s affairs.  In such a proceeding, assets held in a custodial account may not be a source of payment for unrelated claims of creditors when certain criteria are met.