Secondmarket - An alternative to the IPO

A lot of our clients are startups companies where the founders and investors maybe facing liquidity issue as the IPO market has shut down. In this environment, it may make sense for investors to sell some stake in a private market but none has existed till date. One exists now!

The market for initial public offerings has dried up and companies are not being very acquisitive these days. In the first three months of 2009, only 56 companies were sold, half the number of a year ago, and none went public.

What if they had another option? SecondMarket, which operates markets for trading illiquid assets online, is creating a marketplace for trading shares of private companies. It puts investors together with shareholders and collects a fee, which will be 2 percent from each side for the private company market.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/technology/start-ups/23vc.html?ref=technology