“Over the last 12-18 months, we’ve seen HNIs (high net worth individuals), family offices and, now, even institutions leaning into these opportunities, especially in AI and space tech,” said Viram Shah, founder and chief executive of Vested Finance, which pools investor money into feeder funds to participate in such deals.
Platforms such as Forge Global and Nasdaq Private Markets (NPM) have become key gateways to buy and sell these unlisted shares. NPM, which hosts shares of about 15,000 private firms, reported $60 billion in trading volumes. Forge’s Private Market Index — a benchmark for late-stage, venture-backed companies — has climbed 67.9% year-to-date.
Globally, the private secondary market has ballooned into a $100-billion segment. NPM didn’t respond to queries. Forge declined to comment.
Unlike public exchanges with continuous price discovery, these platforms facilitate over-the-counter deals where employees, early investors or venture funds sell to accredited investors. “Private share transactions are negotiated on a deal-by-deal basis, often with limited volumes and longer settlement cycles,” said Pranab Uniyal, head of investment advisory HDFC Tru.
The appeal is obvious — investors want a slice of these companies during the steepest value-creation period. OpenAI’s valuation has surged from $80 billion to nearly $500 billion within a year, while SpaceX has jumped from $210 billion to $350 billion, Shah said. As of Monday, OpenAI shares were trading at $723.12 on Forge, Anthropic at $162.15 and Databricks at $180 apiece. The stupendous surge of the so-called Magnificent Seven stocks — Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Tesla, flag bearers of technological evolution in the past decade — is still fresh in investor memory.
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