Payward, the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the wallet-as-a-service business of Magic Labs. The transaction will add embedded, non-custodial wallet technology to Payward Services, the company’s business-to-business infrastructure platform. Financial terms were not disclosed, and the deal is expected to close within weeks, subject to customary closing conditions.
Expanding Payward’s Infrastructure Offering
The acquisition is intended to broaden the tools Payward provides to companies developing digital asset products. Payward Services already offers infrastructure covering cryptocurrency trading, custody, tokenized assets, on-ramps, off-ramps, and derivatives through a single integration point. Adding Magic Labs’ technology will allow partners to incorporate self-custody wallets and onchain services without relying on several separate providers.
Magic Labs has developed a wallet infrastructure stack combining secure signing technology, an embedded integration layer, and a software development kit. According to the announcement, the platform has powered more than 60 million wallets, processed over $10 billion in stablecoin volume, and served more than 200,000 developers. These capabilities will be incorporated into Payward Services following the transaction’s completion.
Embedded Wallets Become a Strategic Priority
Embedded wallets allow users to access blockchain-based services directly within an application instead of creating and managing a separate external wallet. For businesses, this approach can simplify customer onboarding while enabling payments, trading, asset ownership, and other onchain functions within familiar digital products. Payward considers the technology an increasingly important component of the infrastructure needed to support broader digital asset adoption.
Mark Greenberg, Payward’s chief commercial officer, said bringing Magic Labs’ wallet technology in-house would help the company deliver a more complete infrastructure stack. The combination is expected to unite exchange access, custody services, and wallet functionality under one provider. Payward is presenting the expanded platform as an alternative to fragmented systems that require businesses to coordinate multiple vendors.
Magic Labs Rebrands as Newton Labs
The transaction is structured as an asset sale, meaning Payward is acquiring Magic Labs’ wallet operations rather than the entire company. Magic Labs will continue operating independently under the name Newton Labs, while customers of the wallet unit will transition to Payward Services. The rebranding reflects the company’s decision to focus its resources on Newton Protocol.
Newton Protocol is an authorization layer designed to help institutions, asset issuers, and decentralized applications apply identity, compliance, security, and risk policies before transactions settle. Its technology aims to make authorization decisions verifiable onchain, giving organizations greater control over automated financial activity. Sean Li, chief executive of Newton Labs, said the sale would allow the company to concentrate on Newton while placing wallet customers with a team committed to supporting the business.
Payward Continues Acquisition Strategy
The Magic Labs agreement extends a broader acquisition strategy through which Payward has been assembling infrastructure across trading, payments, token management, and other digital asset services. The company has sought to build shared technology capable of supporting several products and customer groups across different regulatory environments. Its portfolio includes Kraken, NinjaTrader, Breakout, xStocks, Bitnomial, and CF Benchmarks.
For Payward, the acquisition strengthens its effort to become an infrastructure provider serving businesses alongside individual traders and investors. The deal also reflects growing competition among crypto companies to control more of the underlying technology used by institutions and consumer applications. Embedded wallets could become an important access point connecting users with payments, investments, tokenized assets, and decentralized financial services.
Payward’s planned acquisition of Magic Labs’ wallet business brings a widely used embedded wallet platform into its expanding B2B ecosystem. At the same time, the transaction allows the remaining Magic Labs organization, now Newton Labs, to concentrate on authorization and policy enforcement for onchain finance. If completed as expected, the deal will deepen Payward’s infrastructure capabilities and give enterprise partners a more unified route to building self-custodial digital asset products.