Payward Pushes Into AI, Prediction Markets as EBITDA Drops 66%

Payward Builds Broader Finance Platform as Crypto Trading Slows

Kraken parent Payward is trying to become more than a crypto exchange just as its core profitability comes under pressure.

Adjusted EBITDA fell about 66% year over year to $60 million in Q3, though it improved from $23 million in Q2, according to its Q3 2026 financial results. Total Platform Margin, Payward’s new preferred revenue measure, reached $487 million, up 12% sequentially but down 12% from a year earlier.

The company’s answer is diversification.

Trading Slows, but Customer Base Keeps Growing

Total platform transaction volume reached $353 billion, up 22% from Q2 but down 30% year over year.

Kraken still gained share. Its portion of industry spot trading rose to 6.5% in September from 3.3% a year earlier, even as overall market spot volume fell. Funded accounts climbed to 7.1 million, up 37% year over year, while billable accounts jumped 74% to 1.5 million.

The mix is also changing. Asset- and access-based margin now represents 52% of total platform margin, reducing Payward’s reliance on transaction fees. That matters in a crypto market where trading volumes can swing sharply from quarter to quarter.

Prediction Markets and Tokenized Stocks Move Center Stage

Payward said its next U.S. expansion will include prediction markets, along with equity perpetual futures running through its own regulated exchange, clearinghouse and futures broker.

Its tokenization business is also scaling.

xStocks surpassed $1 billion in assets under management in October and now covers more than 700 tokenized equities. Payward has also announced plans with the London Stock Exchange to bring the 100 largest London-listed companies into the xStocks ecosystem, subject to regulatory approval.

The strategy is clear: one account, one risk engine and more asset classes.

Payward Adds AI as Its Fifth Pillar

The company now officially treats AI as a fifth business pillar, alongside trading, banking, asset management and Payward Services.

Its most ambitious plan is a personal finance agent that could eventually act across a client’s portfolio.

Payward says the agent will operate only within user-defined limits, require approval before trades or workflows run, and record every action it takes. The company also plans to train proprietary models on its own trading, balances, payments, identity and risk data.

For Payward, the bet is that the next financial customer may not always be human.

The quarter’s weak year-over-year EBITDA shows why that matters. Kraken’s future growth increasingly depends on building a broader financial platform where crypto trading is only one part of the business.

The London Stock Exchange and Payward are working to bring tokenized versions of major U.K.-listed shares onchain. The partnership could…