Schwab bought Forge. Morgan Stanley bought EquityZen. The pre-IPO stock platforms that stayed independent may have made a better bet.
When Charles Schwab agreed to acquire Forge Global for $660 million last November, just weeks after Morgan Stanley announced its own purchase of rival platform EquityZen, those with an interest in pre-IPO stock absorbed the news with a mixture of validation and unease. Validation, because two of the largest wealth management entities in America had just confirmed what specialists in the market had been arguing for years — that private company shares are no longer a niche asset class but a structural feature of the modern investment landscape. Unease, because the acquisitions raised a question that no party addressed directly: when the infrastructure of a market is owned by institutions with their own substantial interests in its outcomes, what happens to the integrity of that market?
