Magic Labs has sold its embedded wallet business to Payward, the parent company of Kraken, marking a strategic pivot. Wallet customers will now be managed by Payward Services once the deal finalizes, while Magic Labs rebrands itself as Newton Labs and redirects its efforts toward onchain finance infrastructure.
Wallet Business Transfer and Strategic Shift
The sale involves an asset transfer rather than a merger, allowing both entities to operate independently. Since 2018, Magic Labs has built over 60 million embedded wallets and supported more than 200,000 developers, establishing itself as a key player in wallet infrastructure. Post-sale, wallet services will transition smoothly to Payward Services, expanding Payward's digital asset platform through this acquisition.
Newton Labs' New Onchain Finance Vision
Now operating as Newton Labs, the company focuses on the Newton Protocol, which aims to embed compliance, security, identity, and risk controls before blockchain transactions settle. The protocol’s mainnet beta launched in June 2026, introducing an authorization layer that enforces predefined policies during transaction flows.
Newton Labs’ flagship product, VaultKit, targets institutional digital asset custody by enabling automated enforcement of compliance, identity verification, and transaction risk policies. The company plans to broaden the protocol’s application to stablecoins, tokenized real-world assets, and agentic finance, with ongoing collaboration with Polygon AggLayer to enhance cross-chain operations.
Payward’s acquisition strategy aligns with its recent purchases, including Bitnomial for up to $550 million and Hong Kong’s Reap Technologies for about $600 million, strengthening its crypto infrastructure footprint in 2026.
