Payward, the parent company of cryptocurrency exchange Kraken, has partnered with Singapore Gulf Bank to provide round-the-clock US dollar settlement for selected institutional customers in Asia and the Gulf region.
The arrangement connects Payward’s institutional infrastructure with SGB Net, Singapore Gulf Bank’s real-time clearing network. According to Cointelegraph, the integration is intended to let eligible clients settle US dollar transactions instantly rather than waiting for conventional banking hours or settlement windows.
How the partnership will work
The service is initially limited to selected institutional clients, with the companies planning to extend it to more customers and add support for additional currencies. The announcement did not specify how many clients are included in the first phase or identify the currencies that could be added.
Singapore Gulf Bank will also gain access to digital-asset liquidity through Kraken Prime, Payward’s prime brokerage service. In addition, Payward’s markets will be used by the bank to price customer trades in the coming months.
Prime brokerage services are designed to help institutional customers access liquidity and execute transactions across markets. In this case, the arrangement combines that digital-asset market access with banking rails for dollar settlement. The companies said the settlement capability will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
A wider push toward continuous settlement
The partnership comes as banks and financial institutions work on systems that can move money outside traditional business hours. Continuous settlement can be important for institutions trading across time zones, since transactions do not have to wait for the next banking day to be completed.
A consortium that includes JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Barclays plans to launch a tokenized deposit network operated by The Clearing House in the first half of 2027. That network is also intended to support settlement around the clock.
In Japan, Circle and Nomura have reportedly partnered on a service designed to give companies instant foreign-exchange settlement from 2027. Separately, the Bank of Korea unveiled a pilot project on Sept. 21 to allow foreign investors to settle won transactions outside regular banking hours.
These developments illustrate the broader industry effort to modernize payment and settlement infrastructure. Payward and Singapore Gulf Bank’s agreement applies specifically to selected institutional clients and US dollar transactions at launch.
Moneyiar market picture
Moneyiar data at 09:38 on Oct. 5, 2026, showed the following prices and moves:
- Ethena (ENA): $0.2536123792, up 6.86% over 24 hours and down 1.83% over seven days.
- AKEDO (AKE): $0.0317039643, down 7.61% over 24 hours and up 7.1% over seven days.
- Comedian (BAN): $0.0663155939, down 0.31% over 24 hours and up 3.22% over seven days.
- Tutorial (TUT): $0.0373206004, down 6.82% over 24 hours and down 41.91% over seven days.
The TUT figures were recorded in Moneyiar’s data at 07:39 on Aug. 30, 2026, rather than at the Oct. 5 timestamp shown for the other assets.
