Kraken Delays IPO Again, Now Targeting at Least April 2027
Key Takeaways
- •Kraken has postponed its IPO to at least the second quarter of 2027, according to a CoinDesk report.
- •Payward, Kraken's parent company, submitted a draft Form S-1 registration statement to the SEC in November 2025.
- •Co-CEO Arjun Sethi said in May 2026 that Kraken was about 80% ready for its IPO, but reports soon pushed the listing back to 2027.
- •Kraken's listing ambitions date back to 2021, when then-CEO Jesse Powell predicted a 2022 public debut.
- •Other crypto firms, including Coinbase and Circle, have successfully gone public while Kraken's IPO remains pending.
Kraken has pushed back its initial public offering (IPO) to at least April 2027, according to a report on Wednesday. For anyone who has lost count of how many times the exchange has delayed its listing, the timeline stretches back more than half a decade.
Kraken has been hyping its IPO for over five years and was previously very confident it would go public in 2022.
In April 2021, Kraken CEO Jesse Powell told CNBC, "We're looking at being able to go public sometime next year." He is still looking.
By June 2021, according to Fortune, Powell had reconsidered a direct listing following Coinbase's debut. In that article, he shifted to a "second half" of 2022 prediction.
However, by September 2022 that target already looked doubtful. Incoming CEO Dave Ripley told a reporter, "No specificity on IPO plans that we can share." The year ended with only delays and no IPO.
In June 2024, Bloomberg reported that Kraken was raising "final" pre-IPO financing for an IPO that never happened. Then, in March 2025, the same outlet reported that Payward — the parent company of Kraken — was rescheduling its IPO for January–March 2026.
By November 2025, Payward had actually submitted a draft IPO document to the SEC on Form S-1. Its announcement said an offering was expected after SEC review, and Reuters reiterated a first-quarter 2026 forecast.
The IPO saga continues in 2026
By March 2026, CoinDesk reported that Payward had put the IPO on hold and was unlikely to proceed. Reuters said it could not independently verify the delay, which ended up being accurate.
One month later, Kraken urged the public to trust that it had not abandoned its IPO plans. Co-CEO Arjun Sethi confirmed formal IPO filings in April 2026, without naming an updated listing date.
At the Consensus conference on May 5, Sethi called Kraken "about 80% ready" for its IPO and declared, "We're ready."
Within two weeks, however, Bloomberg reported that the IPO would be pushed back to 2027. Wednesday's CoinDesk report delayed it further, to the second quarter of 2027.
The repeated delays come even as other crypto firms have moved to public markets in recent years. Coinbase, whose 2021 debut once shaped Kraken's listing thinking, has traded on Nasdaq since, and stablecoin issuer Circle completed its own IPO in June 2025 — a sign that the listing window for crypto companies has not been closed across the board, making Kraken's timeline stand out further.
What remains unclear is whether the pending Form S-1 process continues to advance behind the scenes. A draft registration only becomes effective after SEC review, so any updated filing or withdrawal notice would be the next verifiable signal of whether the April 2027 target holds.
Shares of Kraken still do not trade on any public stock exchange. After nearly six years, the IPO remains delayed.
