Weekly Newsletter,
Crypto exchanges are now strategic infrastructure
Three of the largest traditional exchange operators have each bought minority stakes in crypto-native platforms over the past twelve months. The build-vs-buy calculation came out decisively on the side of buy.
Deutsche Börse acquired a 1.5% stake in Kraken this week for $200 million, valuing the exchange at $13.3 billion. The partnership spans trading, custody, settlement, collateral management, and tokenized assets, and it is the third such transaction in twelve months. Nasdaq announced a Kraken partnership in late 2025, and ICE committed to OKX at an implied $25 billion valuation. The fact that three sophisticated market-infrastructure operators arrived at the same structural conclusion independently, and through virtually identical approaches, tells you more than any individual deal could.
What is being purchased is not crypto market share in the conventional sense. Deutsche Börse derives a substantial portion of its revenue from settlement: its subsidiary Clearstream sits behind roughly $20 trillion in securities and collects a fee every time ownership changes hands. Once those flows migrate onto blockchain rails, settlement becomes continuous and programmable, which is precisely the model Kraken has spent a decade building. Acquiring a stake is materially faster and cheaper than reconstructing what Kraken has already built to a higher standard.
The logic generalizes across the industry. A traditional exchange operator's franchise rests on three pillars (matching engine, clearing house, and settlement), and in crypto-native venues all three already run onchain, while inside the traditional system none of them has moved at scale. Every traditional operator that has not yet bought into the crypto-native layer will be compelled to do so, and each successive deal sets a higher floor for the one that follows. Building from scratch is no longer a credible alternative.
Also this week
- Charles Schwab begins rollout of spot bitcoin and ethereum trading platform
- Deutsche Börse takes $200 million stake in crypto exchange Kraken
- Visa, Stripe and Zodia Custody join Tempo's payments blockchain as validators
- HSBC completes tokenized deposit pilot on Canton Network
- Clarity Act stablecoin yield language pushed back; ban on idle balances still intact
- SEC exempts 'crypto interface providers' from broker-dealer registration
Relevant financial updates
- Slash, a banking platform, has raised $100mln in a Series C round led by Ribbit Capital, Goodwater Capital, and Khosla Ventures at a $1.4bln valuation
- Drift Protocol*, a decentralized exchange and derivatives platform, has raised $150mln in debt financing led by Tether with investments from Solana Foundation
- Stablecoin Development Corporation*, a centralized asset manager, has raised $134mln in a Post IPO round with investments from Framework Ventures, Tether, and R01 Fund LP
- Brix Money, a decentralized yield services platform for tokenizing emerging market assets, has raised $5.5mln in an undisclosed round with investments from Borderless Capital, Circle Ventures, ConsenSys, and FRWRD
- Kraken*, a centralized exchange, has received a $200mln strategic investment from Deutsche Börse Group
- Nava AI*, an AI tooling platform for financial agents, has raised $8.3mln in a Seed round with investments from Polychain Capital, Hack VC, Archetype, Sreeram Kannan, FalconX, and Seed Club Ventures
- Paxos Labs*, a decentralized payments and U.S. Dollar stablecoin platform, has received a $12mln strategic investment from Blockchain Capital with investments from Robot Ventures, Maelstrom, and Uniswap
*Underlying TBV portfolio position | Prices as per 17/04
Interesting things to read
- The story of how Jeffrey Yan built Hyperliquid, in the Colossus Magazine
- Why Morgan Stanley is all in on crypto, on the Crypto Tape podcast
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