Episode summary
Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman on the Future of 23-5 Trading | At Barron's
At Barron's
· · 13 min · Hosts: Andy Serwer · Guests: Adena Friedman
Summary
Adena Friedman says 23-5 trading is already here in practice, just not fully visible, and Nasdaq plans to extend its own market hours to make round-the-clock U.S. equity trading official on December 6. She argues the shift is being driven by retail participation, better brokerage and market technology, and global demand for access to U.S. stocks. To support the change, Nasdaq is leaning on a consolidated tape, tighter guardrails in the international session, and longer clearing hours at DTCC.
Friedman also frames Nasdaq less as a stock exchange than as a broad market infrastructure and fintech company. She says solutions revenue now makes up a little more than 75% of revenue, while trading is about 22% to 25%, and that the company now sells technology to about 130 markets and regulators around the world. She says the business is designed to support markets, innovation, and trust, from anti-financial crime tools to regulatory reporting.
On IPOs, Friedman says Nasdaq is seeing better momentum in the second quarter and believes public markets can support companies of any size, even as many stay private longer. She calls for disclosure, proxy, and litigation reforms to make going public smoother, while saying private markets still play an important role in capital formation.
Key takeaways
- Friedman says Nasdaq will expand trading to 23-5 on December 6, with the move backed by 24-hour infrastructure changes and real-time clearing.
- She argues 23-5 trading is already happening "in the dark," driven by retail investors and technology that now lets global clients trade U.S. equities almost anytime.
- Nasdaq's solutions revenue is now a little more than 75% of total revenue, while trading contributes about 22% to 25%, according to Friedman.
- Friedman says Nasdaq sells technology to about 130 markets and regulators, underscoring its shift toward market infrastructure and fintech.
- She wants disclosure, proxy, and litigation reforms to make IPOs easier and says public markets should welcome companies earlier.
Notable quotes
“The trading 235 is already happening. It's just happening in the dark”
“our systems today open at 4:00 a.m. and we allow trading to start then and they close at 8:00 p.m”
“we're going to put limits you know up limit up limit downs um to make it so we have more guard rails in trading in the international session”
“our solutions our solutions revenue today, it really goes it's a little bit more than 75% of our revenues”
“there are a lot of elements of the proxy process that both um I would say that can make it very ownorous for a public company”
How the episode opens
235 trading is coming. That's 23 hours a day, 5 days a week. Why is that so important? And isn't that overkill?
The trading 235 is already happening. It's just happening in the dark. When Adena Freriedman became CEO of NASDAQ in 2017, the markets pretty much operated on bankers hours 9:30 a.m.
to 400 p.m. Investing today is an always on proposition thanks to the rise of crypto trading and prediction markets. On December 6th, NASDAQ will join the trend.
It will also legitimize it as it is the first major US stock market to jump on the almost roundthe-clock bandwagon. If we think about investors today, first as you know, we've had a large increase in the number of retail investors that directly interact with markets. The second thing is the technology has really continued to advance itself in terms of both the market technology, but also the brokerage technology to allow for investors from all over the world to be able to trade in US equities any time during the day.
So, the trading 235 is already happening. It's just happening in the dark. Uh, our systems today open at 4:00 a.m.
and we allow trading to start then and they close at 8:00 p.m. So, we are already trading outside of US market hours, but what we're doing is basically expanding that. Uh, at 8:00 we'll take an hour off and then from 9 to 4, we're going to expand our our systems so that we can become round the clock.
Expanding the trading day is a massive technological undertaking and brings with it some risks. But NASDAQ is taking steps to maintain market integrity, including launching a consolidated tape that will broadcast every trade into a centralized feed. — What we've um worked on with the industry is to bring the consolidated tape so that you have central transparency of all of the trading and quoting activity that's occurring in the lit venues and the dark pools um around the world.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- market structure changes
- trading systems
- financial markets outlook
Companies and tickers mentioned
- NDAQ
- Nasdaq
Watch the episode
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Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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