USDPayward Partners With GTN to Expand xStocks Beyond U.S. Equities
Tokenized shares from Hong Kong, Europe and South Korea are planned, pending regulatory approvals
TL;DR
- Payward and GTN plan to expand xStocks into international equities, beginning with companies listed in Hong Kong.
- GTN will provide trade execution, custody and recordkeeping while seeking the required licenses in each market.
- xStocks has processed more than $35 billion in trading volume and supports more than 500 tokenized securities.
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Payward, the parent company of Kraken and developer of the xStocks framework, partnered with investment and fintech infrastructure provider GTN to expand its tokenized-stock offering beyond U.S.-listed securities, the companies announced on July 22, 2026. The planned rollout will begin with Hong Kong-listed equities before extending to the United Kingdom, Europe, South Korea and other markets, subject to regulatory approvals and licensing requirements.
The partnership marks an effort to build a broader international market for blockchain tokens backed by publicly traded stocks and exchange-traded funds. Payward said the arrangement would combine its tokenization framework with GTN’s infrastructure for executing trades, holding underlying securities in custody and maintaining transaction and ownership records.
Mark Greenberg, Global Head of Payward Services, said the expansion was intended to address divisions between national financial markets.
“For decades, we’ve accepted that capital markets should be fragmented by country, currency, and market hours,” Greenberg said. “That’s a legacy financial infrastructure problem.”
Greenberg said international equities represented the next major area of expansion for the product.
“The biggest asset class that hasn’t been tokenized yet is the rest of the world, and our partnership with GTN is about changing that,” Greenberg said.
Greenberg also outlined Payward’s longer-term objective for the platform.
“One asset at a time, we’re bringing truly global capital markets onchain until geography becomes irrelevant to investing,” he said.
GTN to Provide International Market Infrastructure
GTN connects to more than 90 global markets and will supply the traditional financial infrastructure supporting the planned tokens. Its responsibilities will include purchasing or executing trades in the underlying securities, arranging custody and maintaining official records associated with those assets.
GTN is working to obtain the required licenses in each intended market. The companies did not present the expansion as an immediate worldwide launch, and availability will depend on separate regulatory authorization in each jurisdiction.
After securing the necessary approvals, GTN also plans to distribute xStocks products to its institutional clients. That would expand the product’s potential reach beyond crypto exchanges, wallets and retail-oriented blockchain applications.
No specific launch date was disclosed for the first Hong Kong-listed products. The companies also did not identify which Hong Kong, British, European or South Korean companies would be included in the rollout.
The partnership creates infrastructure that could eventually support tokenized asset classes beyond equities. Neither Payward nor GTN identified those additional asset classes or provided a timetable for introducing them.
How the xStocks Structure Works
The xStocks framework uses underlying securities to maintain one-to-one backing between each issued token and the corresponding stock or ETF. Traditional shares are purchased and held in custody before blockchain tokens representing those securities are minted.
The tokens are therefore not presented as purely synthetic instruments that only follow an asset’s market price. Their supply is intended to correspond directly with shares held through the supporting custody structure.
Payward said xStocks had developed integrations allowing the assets to become “portable across the 100+ exchanges, wallets, and DeFi applications.”
That design allows compatible tokens to move between participating trading platforms, self-custody wallets and decentralized-finance applications instead of remaining inside one brokerage or exchange account system.
The structure does not eliminate traditional market intermediaries. GTN will continue to handle regulated execution, custody and recordkeeping for the underlying shares, while the blockchain tokens provide a separate distribution and transfer layer.
The companies also did not explain how dividends, stock splits, mergers, rights offerings, foreign withholding taxes or currency conversions would be handled. It remains unclear whether token holders would receive voting rights, shareholder communications or direct participation in corporate actions.
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xStocks Builds on Existing U.S. Securities Offering
Payward acquired xStocks in December, although the year of that acquisition was not specified. The platform began by offering tokenized U.S. stocks and ETFs during the previous year.
Its existing lineup has included blockchain-based representations of companies such as Nvidia, Apple and Tesla.
The platform now supports more than 500 tokenized securities, primarily covering U.S.-listed stocks and ETFs. A separate description characterized the offering as more than 500 tokenized U.S. assets.
Payward said xStocks had processed more than $35 billion in cumulative trading volume and had nearly 200,000 holders. A separate figure placed the number of holders at more than 200,000, although no named source was attached to that estimate.
xStocks products remain unavailable to U.S. investors even though the underlying assets have primarily been securities listed in the United States. The planned expansion would broaden the available companies and markets for eligible users outside the country.
Adding Hong Kong and other Asian equities could widen access to companies associated with regional technology and artificial-intelligence supply chains. The expansion is intended to increase the range of available companies rather than only issuing additional tokens tied to dominant U.S. technology stocks.
Tokenized Equity Market Remains Concentrated
Approximately $1.94 billion in tokenized equities was outstanding when the figures were recorded. xStocks represented about $515 million of that total and ranked as the second-largest tokenized-equity provider by outstanding value.
Ondo was the largest provider, with approximately $887 million in tokenized equities. The difference between the two platforms was approximately $372 million.
Together, Ondo and xStocks accounted for approximately $1.402 billion, or roughly 72.3%, of the outstanding tokenized-equity market. xStocks alone represented roughly 26.5%.
Citi estimated that the broader tokenized-securities market could reach $5.5 trillion by 2030, including approximately $2.6 trillion in tokenized equities.
The estimate placed equities at close to half of the projected tokenized-securities market. Tokenized securities are being developed as a way to provide faster settlement, continuous trading availability and more efficient movement of assets between investors, intermediaries and trading systems.
Competition Expands Across Crypto and Traditional Finance
Robinhood expanded its tokenized-stock initiative earlier in July 2026, including an expansion beyond its original offering for European users.
Coinbase was also planning to introduce stock tokens, adding another crypto trading platform to the developing market.
The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation had begun testing tokenized-securities systems. Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange had also initiated tokenization projects.
Superstate and Securitize were pursuing structures intended to issue actual securities directly onchain rather than tokens backed by traditionally issued shares held by third-party custodians.
Securitize recently issued its own stock onchain during its initial public offering. That structure differs from the xStocks model, under which conventional shares are purchased and held by a custodian before representative tokens are issued.
Critics of third-party-backed token models have raised concerns involving custody, reserve verification, issuer solvency and the legal enforceability of token holders’ claims. Supporters of natively issued blockchain securities argue that placing the legally recognized security itself onchain could reduce the number of intermediaries between issuers and investors.
The Payward-GTN arrangement will retain regulated intermediaries for the underlying assets while adding blockchain-based portability. Each planned market will still require approved custody systems, compliant distribution practices, investor-eligibility controls and adherence to local securities rules.
FAQ
Where will xStocks expand first?
Hong Kong-listed equities are planned first, followed by additional international markets after regulatory approvals.
Can U.S. investors buy xStocks?
No. The products remain unavailable to investors in the United States.
What will GTN provide?
GTN will handle trade execution, custody, recordkeeping and licensing work for the underlying international securities.
Are the international stocks available now?
No launch date was disclosed, and the rollout remains subject to market-specific regulatory approvals.
This article has been refined and enhanced by ChatGPT.
