Nasdaq, Inc. (NDAQ) Stock Analysis and Metrics

Nasdaq

NASDAQ: NDAQ

$93.90 ▲ +1.81 (+1.97%)

At close: Jul 27, 2026 · 3:59 PM UTC

Financial Ratios

Market Cap53.10 Bn

P/E26.99

P/S6.07

Div. Yield0.01

ROIC (Qtr)0.01

Total Debt (Qtr)8.76 Bn

Revenue Growth (1y) (Qtr)20.51

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About

Nasdaq is a leading technology platform that powers the world’s economies. It designs and operates the infrastructure of modern markets, drives innovation, and builds trust in the financial system. The company provides technology data and advanced analytics that help clients capture opportunities manage risk and strengthen resilience. Nasdaq runs its operations through three business segments: Capital Access Platforms, Financial Technology and Market Services.

Nasdaq earns revenue from selling market data, charging listing fees, licensing index products, providing analytics and workflow solutions, offering financial crime and regulatory technology platforms, delivering capital markets technology services, and collecting trading and clearing fees on its exchanges. It also receives income from tape distribution and colocation services.

The company operates through the following segments: Capital Access Platforms, Financial Technology and Market Services.

• Capital Access Platforms: This segment provides data distribution, listing services, index licensing and analytics tools. It supplies real time and historical market data to investors and distributors, operates listing platforms for companies seeking to raise capital, develops and licenses Nasdaq branded indices, and offers analytics platforms such as eVestment, Nasdaq Fund Network and Nasdaq Data Link. It also delivers corporate solutions including investor relations intelligence, governance and sustainability reporting tools.

• Financial Technology: This segment supplies technology to combat financial crime, meet regulatory requirements and support capital markets operations. It includes the Verafin platform for fraud detection and anti money laundering, the AxiomSL suite for risk data management and regulatory reporting, surveillance solutions for market monitoring, and the Calypso platform for cross asset trading treasury risk and collateral management. It also offers market technology services, trade management tools, colocation facilities and connectivity options for exchanges and financial institutions.

• Market Services: This segment runs the company’s exchanges and provides trading clearing and settlement services. It operates 19 exchanges covering equities, options, fixed income, currencies, commodities and exchange traded products. It collects fees from trading, clearing, tape distribution and colocation. The segment also supports derivative trading in North America and Europe and offers access to Nordic and Baltic markets.

Nasdaq holds a strong position among global exchange operators and technology providers. It competes with the New York Stock Exchange, Intercontinental Exchange, Cboe Global Markets and other regional exchanges. Its competitive advantages stem from proprietary data, advanced analytics, artificial intelligence capabilities, a broad client base and a reputation for reliable, secure technology. The company’s integrated platform enables it to serve multiple facets of the financial ecosystem, giving it an edge over rivals that focus on a single business line.

Nasdaq serves a diverse set of customers including corporations seeking to list securities, investors who need market data and analytics, financial institutions that use its technology for trading risk management and compliance, exchanges and clearinghouses that rely on its market technology, and regulators that require surveillance and reporting tools. The company also works with asset managers, banks, broker dealers and other market participants across North America, Europe and other regions.

Investment Thesis

▲ Bull case

Nasdaq's Financial Technology division is executing a powerful land-and-expand strategy that remains underappreciated by the market, with ACV bookings growing over 50% year-over-year and 80% of those bookings being cloud-based, signaling deepening client relationships and high-margin recurring revenue visibility; this momentum is further amplified by the deployment of its Agentic-AI workforce across more than 500 clients, up 40% since Investor Day, which is not merely an internal efficiency play but a client-facing value driver embedded in Verafin, AxiomSL, and surveillance products, where generative AI for drug trafficking analytics and Reg-Copilot tools are creating new upsell pathways and improving net revenue retention to 110% in financial crime management, a metric the market is overlooking as a leading indicator of durable growth in high-switching-cost segments.
The structural shift toward always-on markets via SEC-approved 23/5 trading launching December 6, 2026, represents a multi-year inflection point that Nasdaq is uniquely positioned to capitalize on, yet the market is treating it as a near-term operational tweak rather than recognizing its potential to unlock persistent demand for Calypso collateral management, Eclipse trading infrastructure, and tokenized securities services with DTCC, where early adoption by global broker-dealers seeking to serve retail investors in non-U.S. time zones will drive sustained volume growth in Market Services and data licensing, particularly as Nasdaq futures already trade 24/5 today, proving the underlying demand exists and only requires regulated venue access to scale.
International expansion of Nasdaq's index franchise is a stealth catalyst with non-U.S. clients now comprising 19% of total ETP AUM, up meaningfully from prior years, and international inflows being driven by strong demand from EMEA and APAC for enterprise license agreements, which grew 32% year-over-year; this trend is structural, not tactical, as global retail brokerage platforms increasingly require real-time Nasdaq data to serve investors accessing U.S. markets, and the company's success in launching 12 international index products in the quarter—including Nasdaq Private Capital indexes for private market benchmarking—creates a flywheel where product innovation fuels distribution, which in turn funds further innovation, a dynamic the market is underestimating as it focuses on short-term ETP AUM volatility rather than the enduring growth of the underlying data and index moat.

Nasdaq's Financial Technology division is executing a powerful land-and-expand strategy that remains underappreciated by the market, with ACV bookings growing over 50% year-over-year and 80% of those bookings being cloud-based, signaling deepening client relationships and high-margin recurring revenue visibility; this momentum is further amplified by the deployment of its Agentic-AI workforce across more than 500 clients, up 40% since Investor Day, which is not merely an internal efficiency play but a client-facing value driver embedded in Verafin, AxiomSL, and surveillance products, where generative AI for drug trafficking analytics and Reg-Copilot tools are creating new upsell pathways and improving net revenue retention to 110% in financial crime management, a metric the market is overlooking as a leading indicator of durable growth in high-switching-cost segments.
The structural shift toward always-on markets via SEC-approved 23/5 trading launching December 6, 2026, represents a multi-year inflection point that Nasdaq is uniquely positioned to capitalize on, yet the market is treating it as a near-term operational tweak rather than recognizing its potential to unlock persistent demand for Calypso collateral management, Eclipse trading infrastructure, and tokenized securities services with DTCC, where early adoption by global broker-dealers seeking to serve retail investors in non-U.S. time zones will drive sustained volume growth in Market Services and data licensing, particularly as Nasdaq futures already trade 24/5 today, proving the underlying demand exists and only requires regulated venue access to scale.
International expansion of Nasdaq's index franchise is a stealth catalyst with non-U.S. clients now comprising 19% of total ETP AUM, up meaningfully from prior years, and international inflows being driven by strong demand from EMEA and APAC for enterprise license agreements, which grew 32% year-over-year; this trend is structural, not tactical, as global retail brokerage platforms increasingly require real-time Nasdaq data to serve investors accessing U.S. markets, and the company's success in launching 12 international index products in the quarter—including Nasdaq Private Capital indexes for private market benchmarking—creates a flywheel where product innovation fuels distribution, which in turn funds further innovation, a dynamic the market is underestimating as it focuses on short-term ETP AUM volatility rather than the enduring growth of the underlying data and index moat.

▼ Bear case

Nasdaq's index business faces a structural headwind from the persistent mix shift in futures volume toward lower-revenue micro and mini contracts driven by retail trading activity, which is partially offsetting strong overall volume growth and creating a drag on capture rates that management acknowledged as a key factor in the sequential decline in index revenues despite strong average AUM growth; this is not a temporary volatility effect but a lasting change in market structure where retail participation in derivatives continues to favor low-cost, low-margin products, and the company's reliance on higher-margin institutional flows in ETPs may not fully compensate if retail-driven futures migration continues to erode the profitability of its core index derivatives business, a risk the market is underpricing given the stability of its ETP AUM growth narrative.
The corporate solutions segment remains a persistent drag on overall growth, with revenue essentially flat quarter-over-quarter due to a muted buying environment driven by lower IPO activity compared to historical levels, and while management expresses optimism about improving issuer engagement in Q2, the fundamental issue is that private markets are increasingly bypassing traditional IPOs via direct listings, private placements, and secondary platforms—trends that Nasdaq's Capital Access Platforms are not fully capturing, as evidenced by the lack of meaningful traction in its Private Capital indexes despite their launch, suggesting that the company's traditional listings franchise may be losing relevance to alternative capital-raising mechanisms that do not generate the same listing, data, or advisory revenue streams, a structural shift the market is ignoring in favor of optimistic IPO pipeline commentary.
Regulatory and operational risks surrounding the tokenized securities initiative are being underestimated, as Nasdaq's collaboration with DTCC and FCC approval remains in early stages, with tokenized trading unlikely to deliver meaningful revenue before 2028, yet the market may be pricing in near-term transformational impact from the equity token design; furthermore, the CFTC's approval of perpetual futures for bitcoin on Kalshi introduces a credible competitive threat to Nasdaq's dominance in crypto derivatives, as offshore and alternative venues begin to offer 24/7 perpetual products that could fragment liquidity and reduce demand for Nasdaq's regulated tokenized equity infrastructure, particularly if retail migrates to unregulated platforms offering lower fees and perpetual structures, a dynamic that could undermine the long-term value of its investments in Calypso, Eclipse, and surveillance systems designed for always-on markets.

Nasdaq's index business faces a structural headwind from the persistent mix shift in futures volume toward lower-revenue micro and mini contracts driven by retail trading activity, which is partially offsetting strong overall volume growth and creating a drag on capture rates that management acknowledged as a key factor in the sequential decline in index revenues despite strong average AUM growth; this is not a temporary volatility effect but a lasting change in market structure where retail participation in derivatives continues to favor low-cost, low-margin products, and the company's reliance on higher-margin institutional flows in ETPs may not fully compensate if retail-driven futures migration continues to erode the profitability of its core index derivatives business, a risk the market is underpricing given the stability of its ETP AUM growth narrative.
The corporate solutions segment remains a persistent drag on overall growth, with revenue essentially flat quarter-over-quarter due to a muted buying environment driven by lower IPO activity compared to historical levels, and while management expresses optimism about improving issuer engagement in Q2, the fundamental issue is that private markets are increasingly bypassing traditional IPOs via direct listings, private placements, and secondary platforms—trends that Nasdaq's Capital Access Platforms are not fully capturing, as evidenced by the lack of meaningful traction in its Private Capital indexes despite their launch, suggesting that the company's traditional listings franchise may be losing relevance to alternative capital-raising mechanisms that do not generate the same listing, data, or advisory revenue streams, a structural shift the market is ignoring in favor of optimistic IPO pipeline commentary.
Regulatory and operational risks surrounding the tokenized securities initiative are being underestimated, as Nasdaq's collaboration with DTCC and FCC approval remains in early stages, with tokenized trading unlikely to deliver meaningful revenue before 2028, yet the market may be pricing in near-term transformational impact from the equity token design; furthermore, the CFTC's approval of perpetual futures for bitcoin on Kalshi introduces a credible competitive threat to Nasdaq's dominance in crypto derivatives, as offshore and alternative venues begin to offer 24/7 perpetual products that could fragment liquidity and reduce demand for Nasdaq's regulated tokenized equity infrastructure, particularly if retail migrates to unregulated platforms offering lower fees and perpetual structures, a dynamic that could undermine the long-term value of its investments in Calypso, Eclipse, and surveillance systems designed for always-on markets.

Geographical Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Peer Comparison

Companies in the Financial Data & Stock Exchanges

S.No.	Ticker	Company	Market Cap	P/E	P/S	Total Debt (Qtr)
1	BTOG	BIT ORIGIN Ltd	1,110.84 Bn	-	-	-
2	SPGI	S&P Global Inc.	130.72 Bn	25.37	8.31	13.32 Bn
3	CME	Cme Group Inc.	92.16 Bn	21.56	13.61	3.42 Bn
4	MCO	Moodys Corp /De/	84.72 Bn	30.28	10.38	7.52 Bn
5	ICE	Intercontinental Exchange, Inc.	84.12 Bn	21.08	9.26	20.37 Bn
6	NDAQ	Nasdaq, Inc.	53.10 Bn	26.99	6.07	8.76 Bn
7	COIN	Coinbase Global, Inc.	44.25 Bn	55.27	6.75	7.76 Bn
8	MSCI	MSCI Inc.	41.65 Bn	30.67	12.49	6.38 Bn

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Investment Thesis

Consolidation Items Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Geographical Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Peer Comparison

Research Tools

Developers

About

Investment Thesis

Consolidation Items Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Geographical Breakdown of Revenue (2025)

Peer Comparison

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