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The outlook for corporates gets harder, American Airlines and Pepsi joining a growing list of companies trimming or pulling forecast you to trade uncertainty, NASDAK hoping to provide stability in this volatile environment, and the nast next Sea. Dana Friedman joined us now for more. Diana, good morning, good to see you.
It's great to see you, great to be here.
Can you describe the last month for us if you can, just how busy have things been described to volume, the activity going through your business?
Well, thanks, thanks for having me.
First of all, we just announced earnings yesterday, so I think that shows a little bit of what.
We've been what we've been working with.
We had twelve and a half percent revenue growth. We had double digit growth in each of our three divisions, and a couple of highlights.
One is within.
Our Capital Axis Platforms division, our index business grew twenty six percent in the first.
Quarter because of inflows.
We had twenty seven billion dollars of inflows in the quarter. Very strong futures volumes as well in our NAS like one hundred franchise. And then we look at our Fintech division that grew ten percent, and one of the highlights there is our anti financial crime business grew twenty one percent,
and that's an important key grower for US. And then within our market services division, which is our trading business, that grew nineteen percent in the first quarter because of record volumes in the first quarter, and we continue to
see those volumes persist and actually grow into April. The first ten days of April, we had five of the top six trading days ever in US equities, four of the top six trading days ever in options, and in one of the days, like we also measured message traffic because that's how how many messages our systems handling during a given day. On the peak day, which was April seventh, we had five hundred and fifty billion messages flow through
our systems on that single day. So it has been an incredible period of time from a trading perspective.
And the one thing.
To note, because we talked about this earlier, you know, you don't get necessarily credit for this, but the fact is that the plumbing within the markets, all of the markets has done really, really well, hyper resilient. I think we've all been able to manage this volume extraordinarily. Well, we're very proud of that at NASAC, and I can tell you that our markets have done quite well in this period of heightened volatility.
We don't thank you when it goes right, but we'd be very quick to criticize you when it goes wrong. That's for sure. You've handled a lot of volume volatility good. When does volatility become bad?
Well, I think the one thing to recognize is volatility in short term volatility.
That then can resolve itself.
I think that's something that we've seen, frankly multiple.
Times over the last five years.
I think the concern is, of course, is if we cannot have some certainty in the markets. You know, investors like certainty, and right now it's a very uncertain environment, so they tend to take a risk off and attitude about that. And as we know, we are hoping to see more companies go public this year.
We did have forty five.
IPOs in the first quarter, raising five billion dollars. One little side fact also, as we had seven companies switched from New York to NASACK in the first quarter, and we crossed three trillion dollar threshold of companies that have switched to NASAK since we starter switch program twenty years ago.
But I also would say though we have a lot of companies that are looking to go public this year, and we and right now, of course, investors are not really in a mode of underwriting a lot of risks, so we're seeing them take a weight and see attitude in terms of how to tap the public markets and when to tap the public markets this year.
That was a very subtle but well placed a shot over at the New York's Act Exchange.
I'm sure that they will be listening.
I am curious about what that pipeline looks like now and how much smaller it is now in terms of IPOs than it was earlier in the year. You know, there's this big question how much of deal has been sort of put on hold and how much have they just been scrapped altogether.
Do you have a sense of that. I think there are more being put on hold.
I mean, we have not seen companies something to decide they're not going to go public.
It's really a matter of they've gotten themselves.
Ready, They've gotten approval, all the approvals they need. It's really now a matter of just having a weight and see attitude, and they should be, you know, in terms of thinking about how can they maximize value for their shareholders, how can they make sure that they're entering the markets in an environment that's well welcoming, and that could be you could find windows and pockets of time throughout the year to be able to do that, and we did, as I said, still have forty five IPOs in the
first quarter. So it wasn't like the markets are shut. It's just a matter of finding those windows of opportunity within a more volatile environment.
Do you see companies trying to decide are having a harder time deciding whether to IPO in New York or in the United States and the deepest markets of the world versus somewhere else base the turmoil that we've seen.
Well, we are really the home to global companies as well as American companies. The conversations continue to be very constructive, robust, they're they're very they're very interested in coming and tapping the American investor and frankly the global investor base.
I mean the United States.
We are the most liquid markets in the world, We have the most the most variety of investors, we have the deepest pools of liquidity. I think those things are, you know, constant attractions. In terms of companies who want to go public again.
It's really more a matter of time.
I mean that it's more a matter of when than if they want to come and tap the public markets in the United States.
I was here during Trump's inauguration while you were speaking to John and Lisa over in Davos, and you are very constructive on the incoming administration when it came to the excitement around IPOs, also deregulation. You're pushing for this regulation overhaul. Are you seeing what you were expecting back in Davos from this administration now in their first one hundred days.
From a regulatory perspective, we are very excited about the fact that we can work constructively with the regulators that are coming into with the positions. With Chair Atkins coming into the SEC, he has deep understanding of the markets. He has a deep understanding of US capital markets and also the need for companies to have a good public company experience and how important that is in terms of giving citizens access to the growth of our economy. So
we are looking forward to engaging with him. We just put out a white paper on the need for reform in the regulatory landscape for public companies to have to be able to have a life as a public company, not have it be oh gosh moment, but more I can't wait moment, And so I think that that's something that.
We're really looking forward to engaging.
Chair Atkins on how big is the tone shift from the Biden administration and Gary Gensler to Chair Atkins.
Well, he just came into office, so we are going to introduce ourselves to him. We actually do know him from when he was a commissioner many years ago, but reintroduce ourselves to him, and we'll look forward to engaging with him as he gets going.
In his new seat.
You've been through a lot of different market right, James, How would you describe this one? How unique is it?
Well, you know, it's funny.
I have actually been part of many, many market events.
I've been at NASSAC started a Nazek.
Thirty two years ago, so I've seen a lot and this is every single one of them is different. I have to say, there's no two situations where you see a lot of volatility that are exactly the same in terms of the causes of volatility. What we've seen in terms of the reactions from investors is pretty consistent. You know, when they know the thing, as I mentioned before, is that they the thing that they like the least is uncertainty.
And in any period of time where you suddenly have a big moment of uncertainty, they take the same attitude, which is a risk off attitude. I'm going to take take someone positions out of the market. I'm going to sit and wait and understand what's happening, and then I'm going to re engage in.
A smart way.
That's a very consistent reaction, but the causes of every single period of market relativity have been different.
Actually over the last thirty two years.
Sunny fils unique this moment, that's for sure. Danta, thanks for dropping by, Thanks you for the time, Thanks for.
Being with us.
A data freightman.
There.
The chair and CEO of Nasdaq