This week the digital-asset industry took another step toward mainstream finance after Kraken won direct access to the Federal Reserve’s payment rails, a change that could reshape how crypto firms move dollars. Kraken Financial received a limited-purpose master account with the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, enabling use of Fedwire for real-time gross settlement of USD payments. The one-year approval includes business- and risk-specific limitations, but it allows Kraken to send and receive dollar payments directly with the central bank rather than routing through correspondent banks, reducing frictions and giving the firm more control over dollar flows. Kraken co-CEO Arjun Sethi said the account lets the company participate as a directly connected financial institution instead of as a peripheral player in the US banking system.
The development underscores ongoing integration between crypto infrastructure and traditional banking, even as the market digests broader headwinds and a prolonged correction.
In corporate treasury news, Bitcoin miner MARA Holdings pushed back on claims it intends to liquidate its BTC holdings. MARA said updates in a recent Form 10-K were intended to expand treasury flexibility, allowing sales if market conditions warrant and permitting periodic purchases, not to authorize a mandated sale of its reserves. Some observers misread the filing as permission to sell the company’s more than 53,000 BTC, a characterization MARA called factually incorrect.
Elsewhere, Bitcoin rewards company Fold strengthened its balance sheet by eliminating about $66.3 million of convertible debt, which also freed 521 BTC that had been pledged as collateral. By retiring two convertible notes the company removed a potential source of equity dilution and reduced conversion risk ahead of plans to launch a Visa-network credit card that rewards users in Bitcoin. Fold went public on Nasdaq in February 2025 after completing a SPAC merger.
On markets infrastructure, a New York Stock Exchange proposal to tokenize equities could accelerate institutional adoption of blockchain-based trading. The NYSE envisions tokenized stocks and ETFs traded on an alternative platform that would support near-instant settlement and 24-hour trading while remaining subject to existing market rules. Under the plan custody and settlement would continue to be handled by the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, and trading would still observe National Best Bid and Offer requirements. TD Securities strategist Reid Noch characterized the framework as a 2.0 evolution of market plumbing that could draw greater institutional participation.
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