PrimaryMarkets Limited (PrimaryMarkets) is pleased to note that Equidate Inc. USA (Equidate) a San Francisco-based marketplace that “makes privately shares available to accredited investors” announced on 26th July 2018 that it raised US$50M Series B at a pre-money valuation of US$150M.
Equidate was established in 2014 (12 months prior to PrimaryMarkets) and previously had raised only small amounts in Seed and Series A rounds but which did include investments from savvy USA-based venture capitalists including Scott Banister, Tim Draper and Peter Thiel (ranked #4 Forbes Midas List).
Equidate currently employs 26 people, typically requires a minimum investment of between US$20,000 and US$50,000 and only serves accredited and institutional investors.
It charges 5% commission on each transaction.
Equidate’s revenue up to earlier this year was quite modest (believed to be circa US$1M pa) but Equidate was fortunate to recently transact a significant line of Spotify Pre-IPO shares with the sellers being Spotify founders and employees.
Spotify subsequently listed on NYSE and was valued at IPO in April 2018 @ US$25.6B.
This Series B funding round was cornerstoned by Financial Technology Partners, Panorama Point Partners and Operative Capital.
Interestingly, one of Equidate’s first advisors was Philip Reicherz (ex-Founding partner SecondMarket) who since 2016 has been North American Representative of PrimaryMarkets.
Commentary:
Nicholas Capp, MD/CEO of PrimaryMarkets said:
“PrimaryMarkets is encouraged by the size and valuation of the Equidate Series B Placement.
PrimaryMarkets is now live for our own A$1.6M Series B placement @ a pre-money valuation of A$15M. This must be viewed by potential investors having regard to the breadth of our offering and business model most recently expanded with our blockchain digital registry service PrimaryLedger and our equity crowd funder Crowd88.”