Desde Davos: Las bolsas según el jefe de listados globales de la Bolsa de Nueva York

La bolsa de Nueva York anticipa un repunte de las salidas a bolsa en este 2026.

Desde el foro económico mundial en Davos, Suiza,

puede conversar con Chris Taylor, el jefe de listados globales y director de desarrollo.

Dice que cruzando los dedos ve al menos cinco ofertas públicas iniciales en las próximas dos semanas

y una de esas apunta a hacer una empresa de América Latina, la Fintech Agibank de Brasil.

Su perspectiva es que, al menos de un grupo de empresas próximas a listarse,

una o dos puedan provenir de la región.

Brasil no sería uno de los países de donde más provengan compañías que buscan al mercado estadounidense,

también de México, aunque sin ofrecer más detalles por tratarse de prospectos cocinándose.

Pero hay más empresas interesadas, lo que confirma la tendencia que hemos visto en los últimos años

de apostar por listados duales en el mercado bursátil mexicano.

La liquidez es el nombre del juego y a ella quieren acceder, de ahí que Brasil cobre relevancia

por el debilitamiento de este en el mercado local.

Si uno mira a los históricos, no es el mejor ritmo que la bolsa de Nueva York P en cuanto a número de ofertas públicas iniciales.

Pero Chris Taylor considera un buen inicio contra lo que se vio a partir de 2021 con la escasez que hubo

y más reciente menciona el cierro de gobierno que hizo que la comisión de bolsa y valores,

la SEC se atrasara en Douglas Verde a un par de estas.

De Latinoamérica, Taylor tiene mucha expectativa con las empresas que acudan al mercado estadounidense,

pero en la región tiene dudas de que la integración bursátil, como la que ocurre entre las bolsas de Colombia,

Chile o Perú, sea la solución a la Baja liquidez.

También hablamos del anuncio que hicieron el pasado 19 de enero sobre una nueva plataforma basada en blockchain

para operar activos las 24 horas del día, incluidos EDF y acciones tokenizadas.

A lo que me responde que no es en respuesta a la competencia, sino a lo que los inversionistas demandan.

Imposible no hablar también sobre el mercado de las predicciones,

y su reciente apuesta en Polymarket, la cual me explica, es una movida inteligente para saber

hacia dónde se mueve este mercado y cómo pueden entrar al juego.

¡Bomptage!

¡To your listeners and Portuguese as well!

¡Oh, great!

Buenas tardes de Davos, de Davos.

So, Chris, let me start with some big news you announced today.

The New York Stock Exchange is creating a platform that uses blockchain technology

to enable 24-7 trading of tokenized stocks on exchange traded funds.

Can you tell me more about this?

Yeah, it's the exciting press release this morning.

And you know, when you think about the New York Stock Exchange,

we've been around for 234 years.

It's an amazing history,

grew up right alongside the United States and its political beginnings.

The only way you could stay around for a couple centuries plus

is to continue to stay ahead of the market and to innovate.

And that is part of our effort as it relates to tokenization.

The other part, too, is at the New York Stock Exchange,

we want to make sure that we're operating within market infrastructure.

And so, the way we have structured our tokenization effort is to really work

with market participants to make sure this gets done the right way.

So, we're just at, kind of, as we, you know, a baseball analogy, we're very, very early innings.

But we've got the technology to do this.

We've got the partners to do this, and we're very excited about what comes next.

Who are the partners?

Part of the partners are Citibank and DNY, who are going to help us

with some of the settlement and so forth.

And then our own technology.

Our pillar technology is our matching engine that we utilize on the stock market every single day.

We're going to be able to use our pillar technology in this tokenization effort as well.

Now, tell me something.

Does this new announcement aims to expand the market access okay,

or is it a response to competitive pressure from crypto assets and digital platforms that already

operate around the clock?

It's more of a response from market participants and the early stages of moving to tokenization.

There have been some other efforts by other participants around the world, around tokenized assets.

We want to make sure that a token that comes from the New York Stock Exchange

has the same equity ownership, the same rights as a share of stock.

And that really is important to market integrity, to market infrastructure.

So, everything in the world is competitive,

but this is really more of our response to market demands for what they want from tokenized

securities as well.

I see. Now, let's take a look into the 2026 panoramics.

How does the listing pipeline looks for this year?

What are you expecting?

More domestic in the US or more international, maybe?

Well, fingers crossed, it's a good year for the IPO market.

Last year was okay.

It was better than the year prior, but a couple things stood in the way.

We had liberation day earlier in the year,

and then the US government shut down later in the year.

And that US government shut down really delayed several IPOs that were

right on the doorstep of coming to the public markets.

And then the next phase of when the government reopens is the backlog at all the agencies.

And the SEC had a backlog of things to get through.

So, that slowed down the process.

So, we're hopeful for a really good 2026 valuations are at good levels.

I think investor interest in new issuance is really high.

We need more public companies, I think investors realize that too.

And we have five companies coming public or scheduled to come public on the NYC

in the next two weeks.

So, that's a good start to the year, happening a little later than we want,

but it's a good start to the year.

So, we're really, really hopeful.

And the NYC, when you look at our listed companies,

they really are the lifeblood of the exchange.

It's over 2,000 companies, 20% of those companies come from outside the US.

And so, when you look at IPOs, they should kind of resemble our current percentage of companies.

So, maybe one in five IPOs will be from outside the US.

Maybe a little bit more.

There's an IPO scheduled to come from Brazil in early February,

Audrey Bank, a FinTech company.

Hopefully, fingers crossed, it works, but they're ready to go.

So, that's a great start for the region.

We're really, really excited.

One in five from that's great.

Yeah, I mean, if the proportion stays true to kind of our listed company community,

if it's more great, if it's less great as well,

you know, Latin America is really important to us.

We have close to 100 companies from the region listed on the exchange.

It's a great community company.

A lot of, you know, companies that have been with us for a long time.

The likes of American Moviro, Petrobras, Valle,

but a lot of newer companies as well, new bank,

VTECs, Globont, really leaders in new technology companies.

And that holds true for Audrey Bank too,

which is scheduled to conduct its IPO.

So, a lot of excitement from companies that have been with the exchange for a long time,

and a lot of new blood, new energy coming to the exchange as well from the region.

So, those five companies you mentioned are about to list,

is the regular number that you can get by the start of a year,

by the start of a month, a week.

How can we measure the pace?

Yeah, it's a great question.

And, you know, there's a lot of historical data that you could look at to look at the pace.

It's probably off to a slower start than maybe we had wanted,

and the market had wanted for a variety of reasons,

particularly the government shutdown.

But, you know, you never know what to expect in the IPO market.

Prognostication, like prognostication and sports or whatever,

is a really, really difficult business.

And when you look at, if you just go back five years,

and you go to March 2020 in the onset of the global pandemic,

what any of us sitting truthfully around a table in March 2020 predicted that 2020 and 2021,

we're going to be these amazing years for new issuances around the world,

IPOs, SPACs, business combinations.

Probably not.

So it's tough to really forecast IPOs.

Currently though, right now, markets are healthy,

markets there's ample demand, and companies are ready.

So we're really, really positive of their term outlook.

I believe it's the time that the companies were waiting for,

because as you already said, we came from five years prior that there was no activity at all.

After 21, right?

After 21, a lot of volatility.

Yes.

So that's good.

And going back to Latin America,

you mentioned that these Brazilian fintech,

which other industries are interested in listing in the US

with the New York Stock Exchange coming from the region?

Yeah, there really isn't a limitation on industry.

If you look last year,

JBS, the big Brazilian company, a global company,

from a very different industry,

had a direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange last year.

And so I never want to get to industry specific,

clearly industries that tend to be in favor with the market are more technology oriented.

And so you do expect from the region more technology companies,

newer companies to come to the US to access really the

bonafil capital awaiting for them in the United States.

Now, this can be a question that can bring more light to our Latin American CEOs.

For a Latin American company,

what is the strongest argument today for listing in New York?

And what is the most common mistake you see in those could try to do so?

So the most compelling argument is always capital and liquidity.

You're not going to find it in a better place.

Brazil is a really interesting case study. A lot of respect for the B3.

They have a great exchange. Most of our companies from Brazil are listed on the B3

and on the New York Stock Exchange.

But the equity markets in Brazil right now are struggling from a liquidity perspective.

The trading volume in Brazil has gone significantly down.

People are investing in fixed income securities like the Juerdos.

And for the time being, hopefully it's a short-term thing because we want equities to do well.

Equities aren't quite in favor.

But if you look at some of our most actively traded securities,

it's those Brazilian ADRs that trade on the New York Stock Exchange as well on the B3,

that have a lot of liquidity.

So the interest in equities in the US from investors in the US and outside the US,

but trading in the US remains very high.

And it's a very significant part of our market.

Not just retail, but institutional as well.

And so that really is the key part of listing in the US,

getting that capital, trying to make an effort

to get the valuations that you see in some of the US industries

and have comparable valuations for a company that's based outside the US.

I think that's probably the most compelling reason to come to the US

is the valuations in the US tend to be higher than other markets outside of the US.

You know that's the thing because I believe the region continues to have a small and

fragmented capital markets relative to its economic size, of course also.

So based on your experience with global issues,

what do you think is the main structural flow limiting the development of Latin American stock exchanges?

For example, Mexico.

Yeah, it's an interesting question.

It's one where my expertise may be

not as high as the US market.

The fragmentation problem that you bring up is pretty interesting

because I think Europe is also struggling with that.

And they're talking about bringing exchanges together to kind of create one liquidity pool.

Yes, for example, like Colombia, Peru, and Chile.

Yeah, so in Latin America, talk about that.

I'm not sure that necessarily is going to work.

It really comes fundamentally down to global investors

being comfortable in participating in certain markets

from an efficiency of trading, how liquid the market is,

how efficient that trading is, the spreads of the bid and offers,

and really the risk of being able to get out of a position.

That really is one of the key things that institutional investors look at.

It's one thing to get in.

You have to get in efficiently and not move the price.

But when you need to get out of a position,

you need to be able to move pretty quickly

and not have any liquidity concerns.

And having a very liquid market in the US allows institutional investors to de-risk their portfolio.

So whether a confederated market in Latin America or Europe

is going to successfully bring that liquidity,

I don't know, I'm a bit skeptical that it will, though.

That's very interesting to know,

because that is a big experiment happening right now in the region.

So going back to volatility, do you see these environments delaying listing decisions

or companies already maybe discounting it?

Because I believe 2026, yes, can be a good year,

but also we have ahead many things that brings a lot of uncertainty in many aspects.

We have the trade war, the geopolitical issues

that maybe can get companies to take a step back again

and not coming forward to list the companies.

So it's a fair question.

I think when you look at volatility that investment bankers and companies look at relative to IPO,

we have a volatility index in the US called VIX, the X.

It's at really low levels right now.

And if you think about all the things that have happened in 2025

and in the first few weeks of 2026, while they may seem volatile,

the reaction from the markets have been pretty muted.

There really hasn't been a lot of volatility introduced,

whether it's the job boning over Greenland,

Venezuela, even some of the economic policies.

Or maybe the Federal Reserve.

Federal Reserve.

Limits on credit card caps, things like that.

There really hasn't been associated volatility in the markets

that would reflect those policies, which is really interesting.

What is the market telling you?

Do they not think these things are going to happen?

Do they think the markets can digest them?

Is AI so powerful that it's going to overcome all this volatility?

It's hard to say, but when you look at the measures of volatility,

they really haven't moved much and they're at pretty low levels,

which is a good thing for the IPO market.

And what about regulation?

Do you see any regulatory changes under discussion in the US

that could significantly alter the appetite

for going public in the next 12 months, for example?

Maybe positive or negative, of course.

Yes, and all positive.

So the new SEC

is really focused on the public markets

and bringing back public markets in the US.

And if you really look back,

it's for our business, it's horrible.

Like the number of publicly traded companies in the United States

has declined significantly over the last 30 years,

about 40, 45 percent decline.

That's enormous.

There are 40 percent fewer companies in the US

than there were 25, 30 years ago.

A lot of reasons for that.

One of the reasons could be regulatory.

And so the SEC is really looking at some regulations.

There's a regulation in the US called SK.

It really governs the qualitative narrative

around many disclosures, financial and other disclosures.

The SEC thinks there's a lot of redundancy.

There's a lot of immateriality in those announcements.

And our companies have told us

that they take a lot of their time,

a lot of their resources,

and a lot of their money to comply with that.

Now, if you think about it,

if you're a big company in the US,

and you're in the S&P 500,

you're a large cap, you're a mega cap,

you have the scale,

you have the resources to comply.

You may not like everything,

but you have the resources.

But if you're a smaller company,

a mid cap company, a small cap company,

it's a lot harder.

And if you're a private company on the sidelines,

thinking about coming public,

and you look at the regulation

that you're going to have to comply with,

you may think twice to go public

before you're a certain size.

And so, companies 25 years ago used to come public

much earlier in their life cycle than they do now.

So some of the regulatory changes,

I think, will not only help companies currently in the market,

but will make it more attractive

to come to the market as well.

And then the big one,

and there hasn't been a rule proposal yet,

so don't want to comment too extensively on it,

but it's been public by both.

The president and the chair of the SEC, Chair Atkins,

is there will be a proposal

to move from mandatory quarterly reporting

to mandatory semi-annual reporting in the US.

A rule process is going to take time,

there's going to get comments on the rule,

there's going to be iterations of the rule,

but that will be very interesting

to see how that changes, the appetite

for younger companies to come to the markets,

to the public markets sooner.

So a lot of exciting things as it relates

to a lighter regulatory touch in the US,

focused on financial materiality.

And that's what investors want.

And that's what companies want as well.

It would be interesting to watch.

Now, let's talk about prediction markets.

Aha.

So they're getting a lot of visibility on Wall Street.

Why betting on this, especially you,

the New York Stock Exchange?

Well, it's prediction markets.

It's not betting, first of all.

But you are betting on, well, you know,

the companies like Polymarket.

Like Polymarket.

So the chair of Intercontinental Exchange,

Jeff Sprecher, is always thinking ahead.

And I think that's really important, again,

for an institution that has been around

a lot longer than most other institutions,

particularly in the US.

It's very important to think about what could come next.

And I think he's been very intrigued.

And we've been very intrigued by not only the

pace of growth of the prediction markets,

the way it's been adopted in society,

both kind of at the retail level,

if you will, by the media at the institutional level.

That it's very intriguing.

Jeff was very impressed by Shane, the CEO,

founder of Polymarket.

And similar to what Intercontinental Exchange

did with Coinbase several years ago,

made an investment to observe what comes next in digital assets,

this investment allows us to get a front row seat

and participate in what comes next in the prediction markets.

We also believe that there is a market for the data

that gets created through these prediction markets.

And a big part of Intercontinental Exchange and the NYSE

is data that we package and resell to institutions

and other participants in the market.

So we're going to find out how institutions

want to consume that data and be there to answer that demand.

So it's a very much a long-term play.

There's so much speed, so much momentum in the prediction markets

that I don't know if anyone can predict what comes next.

But it's nice to be that we're a part of it,

that we not only have a front row seat,

but we're really a significant participant in that as well.

So it is really a strategy at the end of the day.

You're going to see, as you said,

you're going to watch in the front row seat.

Yeah, well think about it, prediction market.

I mean, ultimately we're a market.

We're a market for stocks.

We make markets and options.

We make market in energy contracts.

We are always interested when there is a market convening,

and this is a new market,

and this allows us to be a participant in it.

But what can maybe stop you for going further

once you already know precisely what is going on

around the prediction markets?

For example, from your perspective,

what is the main regulatory red line that has yet to be

resolved on platforms such as polymarket, for example?

Well, I think it's so new that the regulatory framework

is a work in progress.

And by working with polymarket,

having the resources of the regulatory expertise

that intercontinental exchange and New York stock exchange,

this may allow us to play a role in how regulators

think about prediction markets going forward.

Time will tell, polymarket currently is

operates outside the US.

As the regulatory framework comes together,

I'm sure there's an opportunity for them

to operate within the US as well.

OK, and now Chris, last but not least, in a few words,

how can we describe 2026?

2026 is, well, OK, for the stock market, right?

So we never predict where the stock market's going to go.

We've seen all market cycles in 234 years.

We've seen booms, we've seen bus, we've seen crashes.

We've seen pullbacks.

I'm not predicting where the market's going to go.

But I will say, the optimism in the market,

which could be a good or bad thing,

the optimism is very high right now.

There, I think, there, as it relates

to artificial intelligence, technology, 2026

could be the year where the winners separate from,

I don't want to call them losers,

because that's an unfair tag.

Separate from the folks that aren't

accomplishing what they're accomplishing.

So you're going to see some divergence, I think,

in the AI bet, if you will.

And who knows how it turns out?

I hope, though.

My hope is that it's one of the biggest years of IPOs

in the last quarter century.

That is my hope.

I think the public markets are so important

to the US economy, to the global economy.

They're the fairest markets in the world.

It's where price discovery happens.

It's where investors can get access

to the greatest companies of the world.

And so I hope some of these private companies

that are so big now come to the public markets.

That's my hope.

Great.

Thank you very much, Chris, for this conversation.

Absolutely.

From Davos.

Thank you, as well.

Hasta luego.

Hasta luego.