Nasdaq NASDAQ: NDAQ reported third-quarter 2026 net revenue of $1.5 billion, up 14% from a year earlier, as growth in its Capital Access Platforms and Financial Technology businesses helped drive a 19% increase in diluted earnings per share to $1.04.
Chair and Chief Executive Officer Adena Friedman said the company’s results reflected demand for data, cloud technology, artificial intelligence-enabled tools and market infrastructure supporting increasingly connected and extended-hour trading. Solutions revenue rose 18% to $1.2 billion, while annualized recurring revenue grew 14% to $3.4 billion.
Operating expenses increased 12% to $638 million. Nasdaq posted operating income growth of 16%, net income of $588 million, a 57% operating margin and a 60% EBITDA margin. Chief Financial Officer Sarah Youngwood said both margins improved by one percentage point from the prior-year period.
Capital Access Platforms posts 20% revenue growth
Capital Access Platforms generated $641 million in revenue, up 20%, while ARR increased 8%. The segment includes data and listings, indexes, and workflow and insights products.
Nasdaq’s listings business added 15 operating companies that raised $32 billion in proceeds during the quarter. The company said it won eight of the 10 largest IPOs of the period, representing a 79% win rate. Through the first nine months of the year, Nasdaq said it had won 56 operating-company listings, raising $144 billion in proceeds.
Friedman said the IPO market had softened modestly in recent weeks as some companies reassessed timing, but she described the listings pipeline as robust. Nasdaq also expects Hilton to transfer its common-stock listing to the Nasdaq Stock Market in early November.
The company’s index business reported record net inflows of $49 billion in the quarter and $141 billion over the past 12 months. Index revenue climbed 39%, supported by record average exchange-traded product assets under management above $1.1 trillion. Nasdaq launched 32 new index-linked products during the quarter, half of them outside the United States.
Data and listings revenue and ARR each rose 10%. Friedman said demand was supported by clients using Nasdaq data in artificial intelligence applications and preparing for more continuous market operations. Enterprise licenses increased 34% year over year.
Within workflow and insights, revenue rose 5% and ARR increased 6%, led by double-digit growth at eVestment and Nasdaq Data Link. Friedman said 25% of eVestment bookings year to date were related to AI use cases. Nasdaq expanded eVestment’s private-fund coverage to more than 95,000 funds and entered partnerships with Juniper Square and Robinhood.
Financial Technology ARR reaches record growth
Financial Technology revenue rose 16% to $529 million, with ARR growing a record 18%. The company signed 54 new clients, 135 upsells and five cross-sells in the quarter. Cloud-based products accounted for 85% of annual contract value bookings.
Financial Crime Management Technology, which includes Nasdaq Verafin, delivered 23% revenue growth and 19% ARR growth. The business signed 45 new small and medium-sized business clients and three enterprise deals. Friedman said more than 850 clients were using Verafin’s agentic AI workforce, while more than 70 clients had signed paid contracts for those solutions.
Management said it has used a limited “try before you buy” approach for some AI offerings to build client adoption and assess value. Friedman said Nasdaq is beginning to establish a monetization strategy for those tools and expects to extend similar models to other financial-technology products.
Regulatory Technology revenue grew 13%, while Capital Markets Technology revenue increased 14%. Nasdaq cited demand for trade-management services, data-center offerings, market-technology modernization and Calypso products. The company also said HSBC expanded its relationship with Nasdaq by adding Calypso’s exchange-traded derivatives clearing capabilities.
Friedman said cloud migrations remain an opportunity across AxiomSL and Calypso because many established clients continue to operate on-premises systems. Nasdaq estimates cloud transitions generally result in roughly a 1.5-times uplift in annual contract value as the company provides more managed services.
Market Services records third-quarter high
Market Services generated a third-quarter record $309 million in net revenue, up 2%. The increase was driven by higher U.S. equities share and capture, as well as higher trading volumes in U.S. equity options, Nordic cash equities and fixed income.
Nasdaq said it remains on track to begin 23/5 trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market on Dec. 6, 2026. The expanded weekday schedule is part of the company’s broader push toward always-on markets.
On Oct. 15, Nasdaq completed its acquisition of LeveL Markets, adding what it described as the third-largest U.S. alternative trading system by volume. Youngwood said LeveL is expected to contribute $7 million to $8 million in fourth-quarter revenue. Nasdaq will report LeveL and its Digital Liquidity Networks initiative within other revenue in Market Services.
Friedman said Nasdaq remains on track to launch the Nasdaq equity token in the first half of 2027. She said the company is working with DTCC, Kraken and other partners on tokenized equities, while emphasizing that Nasdaq does not support trading structures that operate outside the transparency and reporting framework governing U.S. equities.
Capital returns and expense outlook
Nasdaq generated $616 million in free cash flow during the quarter and $2.3 billion over the past 12 months. The company paid a quarterly dividend of $0.31 per share, totaling $173 million, and repurchased 3.6 million shares for $323 million. Combined dividends and repurchases totaled nearly $500 million in the quarter.
Through the first three quarters, Nasdaq repurchased $1.2 billion of stock. In October, it also launched a variable-notional accelerated share repurchase plan valued between $315 million and $385 million, expected to be completed in the fourth quarter.
The company raised its full-year non-GAAP expense outlook to a range of $2.55 billion to $2.58 billion, from a prior range of $2.53 billion to $2.57 billion. Youngwood attributed the increase to recently completed acquisitions and stronger-than-expected revenue performance. Nasdaq maintained its projected 2026 non-GAAP tax rate of 22.5% to 24.5%.
About Nasdaq (NASDAQ:NDAQ)
Nasdaq, Inc is a global financial technology and market infrastructure company best known for operating the Nasdaq Stock Market, one of the world's largest electronic stock exchanges. The company provides listing services for public companies and operates trading venues for equities, options and other financial products. Its exchange business serves companies, investors and market participants in the United States, as well as through Nasdaq's Nordic and Baltic market operations.
Beyond its exchange activities, Nasdaq provides market data, analytics, indexes and technology used by exchanges, brokers, banks, asset managers and other financial institutions.
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