With the acquisition of Staked, Kraken Exchange expands its crypto staking business.

 

Kraken, a cryptocurrency exchange, has acquired Staked, a non-custodial platform that makes digital asset staking more accessible.

Staked, a non-custodial staking platform that allows investors to multiply their holdings in digital assets created on proof of stake blockchains, has been acquired by Kraken, a large American crypto exchange.

The deal's parameters aren't public, but Kraken claims it's "one of the largest deals in crypto history."

In a statement, Kraken said, "This purchase nicely compliments our existing custodial staking solution, enabling all of our clients to earn rewards on their crypto while maintaining complete control over their digital assets."Staking is a method of generating passive revenue from cryptocurrencies via the proof of stake consensus mechanism. Users pledge their crypto assets to the network in order to help validate transactions and improve security.

Users are rewarded in exchange, most typically in the cryptocurrency they stake, with average yield rates changing each network.

Solana, Ethereum 2.0, Cardano, Terra, Avalanche, Polkadot, Binance Coin, Algorand, and Polygon are among the most popular crypto assets for staking, according to data from Staking Rewards.

The fact that Staked provides non-custodial access to cryptocurrencies means that customers retain complete control over their private keys, which is a major element of Kraken's latest acquisition.

According to Kraken, the exchange respects and supports its customers' right to keep custody of their crypto, even if this comes with security trade-offs.

“With this acquisition, our clients now have more options on how they choose to manage their funds when staking with Kraken,” added the firm.

Kraken’s history of acquisitions

Kraken, which earlier this year celebrated its 10th anniversary, has a long history of acquisitions, including the purchases of Swiss-based charting and trading terminal CryptoWatch in 2017, London-based financial services firm Crypto Facilities in 2018, and crypto markets data and intelligence firm CryptoFinance.ai in 2019.

According to Kraken, Staked is its fifth acquisition in 2021. The San Francisco-based exchange also said that so far this year its staking business grew by around 950% to nearly $16 billion.

Last week also saw the launch of Kraken Ventures, an independent investment fund led by Kraken alumni targeting early stage companies and protocols powering the next wave of crypto and fintech innovation.

Kraken Ventures’ areas of focus include financial infrastructure, Web3, decentralized finance (DeFi), and consumer crypto protocols, with Blockdaemon, Anchorage, Messari, Hashflow, Acala, and pStake among the firms to already receive financial backing from the fund.