Introducing Nasdaq

There was a time when floating on the New York Nasdaq exchange was all the rage for anyone in the tech sector, then it all seemed to go a bit quiet.

Charlotte Crosswell and Jim Lawrence, chairman of Marine Money Int.

But things could be stirring again, even if not in the quite the way you might think. Jenny Chapman went to see Charlotte Crosswell, president of Nasdaq OMX, Europe.

Rangy and good-looking, she rides a Vespa to work and her pastimes have included kick-boxing.

As this description could equally apply to a man, Charlotte Crosswell will probably not mind. She does not want to talk about her personal life, most certainly is against one of those “How does she do it?” pieces, and, actually, so am I. As she says: “There are work/life challenges you have to work out.” Here we are, sitting on the sixth floor of an office block in the City of London, in the European headquarters of Nasdaq, headed by Charlotte.

Someone intimated to me not so long ago that Nasdaq was just about washed-up this side of the Atlantic, but they could well have got this wrong, and Charlotte seems a million miles from WU.

She gives off a frantic pace, says she gets through the day by not taking breaks, but later admits she has lunch with bankers most days; there again, the latter probably doesn’t count; these will be high-octane occasions for spotting opportunities.

Charlotte has a degree in French from Southampton, says she was possibly the only one among her peers to come out of uni with money in the bank: “I worked all through, learnt to type, which was probably the most useful thing I ever did, worked in bars, as a PA. I have people applying here with rocket science degrees and no work experience. Everyone has a degree now, so you need to differentiate yourself.

“I wanted to go into the City, so I signed on with an agency. Goldman Sachs needed someone to speak French for a day, and then a week, and then they offered me a job. I was not typical; I didn’t come out of Harvard or Yale.

“I worked for a Japanese woman, and when she left I took over her accounts.” An opportunity came up at the London Stock Exchange and Charlotte didn’t hesitate: “I moved ten times internally and ended up running the international listings business. I had some really interesting roles the six years I was at LSE, travelled all over the world, was involved a lot with the start of AIM.” In 2003 she was head-hunted by Nasdaq to run their international listings business: “I was the only officer outside New York then and it was crazy, two day trips to Beijing, doing China and the US in a week, there was just so much to do.” There was a trend for European companies to look to US listing, but this became less appealing with the advent of Sarbanes-Oxley (aka Public Company Accounting Reform & Investor Protection Act) which made the whole thing more expensive.

“We saw a decline in European listings, but more coming from emerging markets without capital markets themselves. In 2006/7 we did 50 IPOs for China and now there are 111 we’ve listed. Israel was the biggest (outside the US) for us and now has 60, having been overtaken by China.

Nasdaq team

“The US pride themselves on taking companies from the very early stages of listing to IPO, and provide a suite of services, including investor relations, PR, surveillance support.” This is where the opportunities are, and not just for listed companies, but beyond, which is one of the reasons for the lunches with banks. Regulation is growing thick and fast and financial institutions need the sort of technology developed by Nasdaq over the years.

Nasdaq made itself a “one-stop-shop” as Charlotte puts it, for companies wanting to list, and, as its literature states “We are here for you when the bell stops ringing”, which, translated, means aftercare, not seeing the job ending at the point of listing, but just beginning.

“We can also provide services for those who want to list elsewhere, perhaps on AIM.” Services surrounding listing are much more the thing in the US: “It’s highly competitive and there is all the pomp and glamour of ringing the bell and trading on the floor even though Nasdaq has been electronic from day one and always known for technology; but over the years its become much wider.” Opportunities in China have broadened the horizon for Nasdaq, and today the companies listed include all sorts, even a pig farm.

Charlotte - at the centre of things

And then there is the razzamatazz: “You need visibility. And Nasdaq does that.” It’s not just the road shows and general PR, either, it’s flashing neon ads all over Times Square. Imagine being able to take over the whole of Piccadilly Circus in this way? “We always strongly advocate that companies should continue to tell the story, because they are competing for analysts’ coverage, and that’s important, because what investors don’t like is no news.”

Charlotte relates all this with great vivre and zest, and adds: “It’s a lot of fun, whether it’s a £20m deal or a £20bn deal.” Over the years, which for Nasdaq began in 1971, many companies providing the vital services associated with floating and trading have been bought by the New York exchange, and this continues, with clever tech companies being snapped up to provide those services the banks need to cope with increasing regulation.

So these days, think of Nasdaq as a lot more than just a trading platform, although it does have 3,600 companies listed in 46 countries with a total market value of $5.2 trillion. And the Nasdaq technology powers 70 exchanges in 50 countries, making it the world’s largest exchange company.

“Nasdaq is the home of technology and that’s how we want to be seen,” Charlotte says. “If we don’t get a tech listing we get pretty upset about it.” Nasdaq tried to get a new European exchange going in 2008, but last year gave it up as a bad job, although the OMX stands for the group of Nordic and Baltic exchanges the Americans own.

“Now we are looking for the next opportunity, with the banks. And more and more asset classes are going electronic.” Nasdaq, of course, has the technology.