Payward, the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Saldo Finance Oy, the Finnish holding company that owns Lithuania-licensed Saldo Bank UAB. The deal, announced on October 14, 2026, is expected to close during 2027 pending regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. The purchase price was not disclosed.

The transaction would give Payward Banking access to an existing specialized EU banking license and an operational footprint already spanning several European countries. Saldo Bank currently operates in Lithuania, Finland, Sweden and Germany, with its authorization also passported into the Netherlands.

Existing Operations and Planned Services

Saldo Bank holds a specialized banking license granted by the European Central Bank in October 2021 and is supervised by the Bank of Lithuania. Its current activities include retail term deposits across its four operating markets, consumer lending in Lithuania, Finland and Sweden, and business lending in Lithuania and Finland. A credit card product has been launched in Finland, with a Swedish rollout planned for 2027.

The bank also provides banking-as-a-service infrastructure that allows fintech partners to embed lending products. Partnerships of this type already exist in Finland and Germany. Payward intends to integrate these capabilities to support interest-bearing deposits, secured and unsecured consumer and business loans, payment cards, and access to the Single Euro Payments Area network.

Payward co-CEO Arjun Sethi described the acquisition as a continuation of the company’s multi-year effort to build regulated financial infrastructure. “A regulated EU bank is the piece that lets us serve European clients the way a primary financial institution should: one place to hold assets, move them freely, and put them to work,” Sethi said.

Jarkko Mäensivu, president of Saldo Bank, stated that a banking license gains value from the services built upon it. He noted that combining Saldo’s established multi-country operations and lending infrastructure with Payward’s regulated platform could enable customers to access banking, payments and credit through a single provider.

Broader Banking Strategy

The European move follows Payward’s development of banking services in the United States. The group already holds a limited-purpose Federal Reserve master account through its Wyoming-chartered institution Kraken Financial and an electronic money institution license from the Central Bank of Ireland. Payward reported having originated more than $2 billion in loans through its existing operations.

In May 2026 the company applied to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for a national trust company charter focused on digital-asset custody. Separately, Kraken obtained Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation authorization from the Central Bank of Ireland in June 2025, allowing regulated crypto services across the European Economic Area. In August 2026 Payward launched a multi-asset debit card in the United States via the Krak payment app.

Payward has not specified a timetable for making Saldo’s products available to Kraken customers or the order in which countries will receive new offerings. Product launches will depend on regulatory permissions, customer eligibility and the completion of integration work after the transaction closes.

The acquisition agreement marks a further step in Payward’s expansion of traditional financial services alongside its cryptocurrency exchange business. Regulatory reviews and integration planning are already under way, with the companies targeting completion in 2027 once all required approvals and conditions are satisfied.