Kraken
Leadership History
2 leaders · 2023 to present
Arjun Sethi and Dave Ripley (co-CEOs) is the CEO of Kraken, in the role since 2024.
| Name | Role | From | To | Years in role |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arjun Sethi | Co-Chief Executive Officer | 2024 | Present | 2 |
| Dave Ripley | Co-Chief Executive Officer | 2023 | Present | 3 |
Kraken is one of the longest-running crypto exchanges, known for its security record and euro liquidity. Under co-CEOs Arjun Sethi and Dave Ripley, parent Payward is turning it into a multi-asset platform covering crypto, US futures through NinjaTrader and Bitnomial, tokenized stocks and banking, ahead of an IPO expected no earlier than 2027. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Kraken earns money in four main ways. 1. Transaction fees: maker-taker fees on Kraken Pro and spreads on simple retail purchases, which made up roughly 47% of 2025 adjusted revenue. 2. Derivatives: crypto futures through Kraken Futures plus US futures and options through NinjaTrader and Bitnomial. 3. Asset-based income: staking commissions, interest and financing on customer balances, and custody fees on about $40-50 billion of platform assets. 4. Institutional and B2B services: OTC block trading, prime services and infrastructure that partner firms build on via APIs.
Co-Chief Executive Officer
2024 – Present
2 years (current)
Sethi was explicitly brought in as Co-CEO to aggressively modernize Kraken's consumer application and heavily expand the company's lucrative institutional derivatives platform in offshore markets.
Appointed Co-CEO alongside Dave Ripley, he manages the massive product expansion strategy as Kraken attempts to close the massive volume gap with Binance.
Co-Chief Executive Officer
2023 – Present
3 years (current)
Joined Kraken through its 2016 purchase of his startup Glidera and served as COO before becoming CEO in 2023. Led Kraken through the 2023 SEC staking settlement and the SEC exchange lawsuit, which was dismissed in March 2025, while expanding licensed operations in Europe and Asia-Pacific.
Professionalised Kraken's licensing and institutional business ahead of its planned IPO; co-CEO with Arjun Sethi since October 2024.
Kraken's revenue still swings with crypto prices and trading activity: in Q2 2026 platform volume fell 18% year over year to $310 billion and adjusted EBITDA dropped about 71% to $23 million even as revenue grew. It competes with Coinbase, Binance and brokers such as Robinhood on fees, must integrate costly acquisitions (NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion, Bitnomial for $550 million), and operates under different licensing regimes in the US, the EU (MiCA), the UK and Asia-Pacific. Its IPO, filed confidentially in November 2025, was put on hold in March 2026 and is now expected no earlier than Q2 2027.
Kraken is led by co-CEOs Arjun Sethi (since October 2024) and Dave Ripley (CEO since 2023). Co-founder Jesse Powell serves as chairman.
Jesse Powell co-founded Kraken in 2011 and served as CEO for 12 years until 2023. A well-known early Bitcoin pioneer, Powell founded Kraken after witnessing the operational chaos at Mt. Gox, building Kraken into a security gold standard and becoming Chairman of the Board.
In 2011, Jesse Powell traveled to Tokyo to assist Mt. Gox (then the world's largest Bitcoin exchange) after a major hack. Realizing that Mt. Gox was run haphazardly and could fail, Powell returned to the US to build Kraken as a professional, secure replacement.
Jesse Powell established a highly libertarian, mission-driven corporate culture centered on individual liberty, financial sovereignty, open debate, and crypto philosophical purism, codified in Kraken's famous corporate culture manifesto.
Under David Ripley's leadership, Kraken successfully secured vital regulatory licenses across the UK (FCA), Australia (ASIC), Germany (BaFin), Ireland (Central Bank of Ireland), and the UAE (ADGM), positioning Kraken as a premier compliant global exchange.
Jesse Powell serves as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Payward, Inc., focusing on crypto industry advocacy, long-term product vision, user privacy protection, and guiding Kraken's major strategic initiatives.
Dave Ripley serves as CEO. He took over in 2022 from the legendary founder, Jesse Powell. Powell is a massively polarizing figure in the crypto industry; he famously refused to shut down Kraken accounts for Russian citizens during the Ukraine war (citing extreme libertarian values) and stepped down as CEO after sparking massive outrage over highly controversial internal cultural debates.
Compare executive leadership tenures and strategic transitions
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