NASDAQ Inc has acquired the SecondMarket, the software company facilitating liquidity for private company securities. This is not a hostile merger – the Second Market CEO will retain his leading role in new alliance.







“I am excited to announce it,” wrote the founder of SecondMarket Barry Silbert on his Twitter account.





According to the official release , the new owner will merge the SaaS company with one of the NASDAQ divisions.

“SecondMarket will be integrated into NASDAQ Private Market, serving customers worldwide with bicoastal headquarters in New York and San Francisco. Bill Siegel, CEO of SecondMarket, will lead the business. The combination establishes a leading provider for innovative and efficient solutions to deliver secondary liquidity and equity management services.”





After the merger Private Market will serve a diverse client portfolio of over 200 world's most innovative private companies, including DocuSign, Pinterest, Shazam, and Tango.









The news about the merger became a positive shock for the industry and appeared in main financial newspapers including The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg





Earlier this year the New York-based stock exchange Nasdaq announced its plans to incorporate blockchain into its operations in the near future. The ledger technology will become available on Nasdaq Private Market (NPM), an exchange launched in January 2014 to handle pre-IPO trading among private companies.





SecondMarket serves as a custodian for Bitcoin Investment Trust, a bitcoin company created by Barry Silbert. It appeared in the market early in 2014 and was the winner of the second auction for Silk Road bitcoins. This March SecondMarket Inc did not succeed in the third auction for Silk Road bitcoins which were sold by the U.S. Marshalls service.

Roman Korizky