December 26, 2022 | News

Kraken’s 2022 year in review

There has never been a dull moment in crypto, and this year was no exception.

In 2022, Kraken celebrated 11 years of our mission to accelerate the adoption of cryptocurrency so that you and the rest of the world can achieve financial freedom and inclusion. It’s been quite a ride.

Our singular focus on this mission has allowed us to stand the test of time and endure more than a decade of highs, lows, frenzies, and FUD while establishing ourselves as a leader in the crypto industry.

2022 was full of highlights and challenges. We are thrilled to look back on the year that was as we prepare to serve and secure our clients in the year ahead.

NFT

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) dominated the conversation this year, with a countless number of people entering the crypto ecosystem thanks to these unique digital items. Always looking for new ways of empowering our clients to connect and transact, we announced the waitlist to become a beta tester for the Kraken NFT marketplace earlier this year and were thrilled to see the response from our community.

After announcing 70 NFT Collections for Kraken NFT Beta Testers to explore, collect and trade, we opened Kraken NFT for a select group of beta testers from our waitlist in November. Some of the hottest NFT collections, including Bored Ape Yacht Club, CryptoPunks, Cool Cats, Doodles, World of Women and many more, are available on Kraken NFT today.

After months of testing and refinement, we opened Kraken NFT to all. Now, it’s your chance to explore, collect and trade with zero gas fees* on Kraken NFT — the NFT marketplace built from the ground up to be secure, easy to use and dynamic.

We are continuing to add new collections to Kraken NFT each week and encourage everyone to follow the Kraken NFT blog for our latest updates, as well as our newly launched @KrakenNFT Twitter account, to be the first to know when new collections are available.

Kraken Pro

For advanced crypto traders looking to gain a competitive edge, we launched our new and improved Pro trading interface. Built with professional traders and alpha seekers in mind, the new Kraken Pro web trading interface combines spot, margin trading, staking, and portfolio management all in a seamless, modern UI. It also boasts a highly customizable and scalable front end, so you have full control to adjust, rearrange, resize, stack, nest in tabs and expand in pop-outs — so you can make the most efficient trading interface that fits your needs.

Lightning Network

Kraken has always been known for building world class products and delivering the most forward looking tools that empower financial freedom and inclusion. We certainly upheld that reputation this year.

Earlier in 2022, we announced that we now support instant Lightning Network BTC transactions. The Lightning Network allows people all over the world to quickly and cost-effectively transact using bitcoin. Kraken Intelligence, our in-house team of crypto analysts, discussed how Lightning Network is supporting Bitcoin’s evolution from a store of value to a medium of exchange in their report, The Lightning Network: Bitcoin’s Evolution to Medium of Exchange.

If you are new to the benefits of the Lightning Network and would like to find out how it works, you can check out our Learn Center’s guide to What is the Lightning Network?

To get started using the Lightning Network, you can also check out our Support Center guides for Connecting to Kraken’s Lightning node and our guide on How do I send bitcoin on the Lightning Network?

Staking

Though Kraken has always — and will continue — to advocate for self custody of crypto assets and encourage our clients to keep their crypto safe themselves, 2022 was a big year for crypto staking at Kraken. We even added staking to our Pro mobile app so you can stake on-the-go and earn rewards on your crypto from anywhere.

Over the past year, we’ve enabled our clients to stake several new coins using Kraken, including:

With Kraken, you can stake dozens of cryptoassets and earn some of the most reliable reward rates in the industry through our streamlined staking services.

ETH Merge

With so many industry defining moments happening over the past year, it’s easy to forget that one of the most hotly anticipated events in the history of crypto took place just a few months ago!

The Ethereum Merge was a huge success, as the world’s second largest cryptocurrency completed the final phase of its transition from a proof-of-work to proof-of-stake blockchain. The event took place at block height 15,537,393 on September 15, 2022.

Kraken was one of the first exchanges to re-open trading of ETH after the transition. We were also one of the first exchanges to list and distribute the newly created EthereumPoW (ETHW) token that followed.

Want to learn more about the Ethereum Merge and what it means for the future of one of the world’s largest blockchain protocols? You can get started with the Kraken Learn Center’s article What is The Ethereum Merge?

After that, you can take an even deeper dive into the Ethereum Merge with Kraken Intelligence’s report Ethereum 2.0: Does ETH become deflationary post-Merge? or take a more nuanced look into the various pros, cons and tradeoffs of both proof-of-work and proof-of-stake with their report PoW vs. PoS: Securing the Chain.

Token listings

2022 was a strong year for token listings at Kraken. Simply put, we listed more tokens than we have ever listed in a single year.

In the process, we more than doubled the amount of cryptocurrencies you can buy, trade, and sell on Kraken compared to last year.

We now offer more than 200 cryptocurrencies on Kraken and continue to add the most innovative projects shaping the crypto industry.

But don’t just take our word for it. Check out each of the announcements marking the launch of more than 130 tokens we listed over the past year:

Bear markets are for building

Undeterred by the headwinds, we kept building no matter what the market threw at us. Our over the counter (OTC) desk announced a new AutoRFQ and OTC portal for instant block trading, allowing clients to independently request and accept automated block trade quotes via the Kraken OTC desk.

Always looking to support our institutional clients, we made it easier than ever to get started thanks to several new pages tailored to investment funds, corporate treasuries, crypto miners, trading firms and wealth managers we serve.

We also added native support for several blockchain protocols. We were thrilled to support deposits and withdrawals of USDC via the Solana and Tron networks, as well as MATIC deposits and withdrawals on the Polygon Network.

Bear markets aren’t just for building, they are also for accumulating. That is why we added recurring buy functionality, so you can consistently build your crypto portfolio automatically. Also known as dollar cost averaging, recurring buys refers to a simple, beginner-friendly investment strategy whereby a person makes small, regularly scheduled investments in a particular asset over a period of time, instead of investing the entire sum at once.

No mission but The Mission

Kraken has built a reputation for not just leading the crypto industry, but supporting others making an impact within the industry as well.

This year, we continued our commitment to maintaining the Bitcoin Rust repository by funding developer Tobin Harding (tcharding),who will now be fully dedicated to coordinating Bitcoin Rust code review, encouraging and sponsoring new contributors, facilitating vital contributor meetings, and improving the infrastructure powering the global Bitcoin network. The news followed Kraken’s September 2021 announcement of a Bitcoin Rust development fund, started in memory of our late colleague and early Bitcoin Rust contributor Tamás Blummer.

More recently this year, we also donated $100,000 to Anti-Human Trafficking Intelligence Initiative, a U.S.-based nonprofit that harnesses intelligence to help financial institutions, technology firms and cryptocurrency exchanges combat human trafficking and child exploitation.

Unfortunately, one of our biggest highlights of the past year came in the wake of one of the most unthinkable tragedies, the invasion of Ukraine. Our reaction? Kraken Distributed Over $10 Million in Aid to Clients Impacted by Ukraine Crisis.

Kraken clients who created an account from Ukraine prior to March 9, 2022 were eligible to receive $1,000 in bitcoin that could be immediately withdrawn from our exchange. The response was overwhelming, as we received an outpouring of support from those affected:

“We have a baby and we left our home in Kharkov and lost our job[s]. This is a significant help for us in such a difficult time. I will be able to buy food for us and everything we need. At such moments, we understand that the world is filled with kind people and support us.”

“You helped me a lot, I bought a bulletproof vest at your expense.”

As we continue our mission to deliver financial freedom and inclusion worldwide, these two testimonies, among hundreds of messages in response to our support, were undoubtedly some of the brightest moments of the year.

Our clients in Ukraine were not the only ones to recognize the industry defining standards Kraken continues to set. We celebrated excellence in cybersecurity with a new accreditation as we earned our ISO 27001 certification, a global cybersecurity standard that demonstrates our continued commitment to our clients’ information security on our platform.

Furthermore, the European Customer Centricity Awards recognized Kraken’s as the winner in the Customer Success category. We were thrilled to see our Account Management team win out against 176 competitors with our industry leading NPS score of 83 and a CSAT score of 99.999% from their institutional and VIP clients. In the process, we once again proved ourselves best in class — not just across all crypto exchanges, but all financial services companies.

As we continued to assemble our executive team of world class professionals this year, from Chief Financial Officer Carrie Dolan to Chief Marketing Officer Mayur Gupta, we also took a moment to reinforce our crypto-first culture.

Kraken Culture Explained laid out “The Tentaclemandments of Kraken,” reinforced The Mission and explained what it truly means to embody the values of a Krakenite. The response was overwhelming and thousands flocked to our careers page for the opportunity to join us on this mission.

As our co-founder and CEO Jesse Powell prepares to step up to the Chairman role and pass the helm to COO Dave Ripley, we are grateful for Jesse’s leadership, as well as his dedication to crypto values and Kraken’s mission over the last 11 years — and we are thrilled to have Dave as our new CEO as we embark on our second decade of growth and global adoption.

It’s been a long year. The cryptocurrency industry changes every day but this year it felt like a roller coaster. The best thing? That change brings us closer to a future where crypto is ubiquitous and financial equality is paramount. And we thank you for joining us for the ride.

These materials are for general information purposes only and are not investment advice or a recommendation or solicitation to buy, sell or hold any digital asset or to engage in any specific trading strategy. Some crypto products and markets are unregulated, and you may not be protected by government compensation and/or regulatory protection schemes. The unpredictable nature of the cryptoasset markets can lead to loss of funds. Tax may be payable on any return and/or on any increase in the value of your cryptoassets and you should seek independent advice on your taxation position.