Incumbents Validate Private Markets Infrastructure
Ben Haber, CEO of Monark, on why 2026 is the year of alts
These deals matter because they show private markets are no longer a side product for banks and brokerages, they are becoming a core account growth and wallet share product. Big incumbents are buying access, distribution, and operating know how all at once. That makes the next bottleneck the plumbing, meaning the software, custody, compliance, settlement, and product packaging needed to let hundreds of smaller brokerages and RIAs offer pre-IPO shares, evergreen funds, and other alts without building the stack themselves.
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The acquired assets map to different pieces of the same value chain. Forge gives Schwab a private share marketplace and issuer network. EquityZen gives Morgan Stanley a retail friendly access layer for private company secondaries. Industry Ventures gives Goldman a venture secondaries and fund platform to manufacture product for clients.
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What incumbents already own is the hardest part to replicate, which is distribution. Monark's live partnerships with Apex, BBAE, Viewtrade, and Vested show brokerages already have investor accounts and assets on platform. What they need is the backend to source deals, form SPVs, handle KYC and AML, settle trades, and support liquidity in a repeatable way.
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Consolidation does not remove the opportunity for infrastructure, it sharpens it. Bank owned platforms will likely become more captive, while independent RIAs, regional brokerages, and fintech brokers still need neutral rails. That is the same role clearing firms and custody platforms play in public markets, but for private assets instead of listed stocks and ETFs.
The market is heading toward a split structure. The largest banks will bundle private markets into their own wealth platforms, while the rest of the industry will buy turnkey infrastructure from specialists. As more advisors want model portfolios with private credit, private equity, and selected pre-IPO exposure, the winners will be the firms that make private assets feel operationally as simple as buying a mutual fund.