InvestX expands leadership team with two key appointments

By Edlyn Cardoza

InvestX Capital Ltd., a leading private equity marketplace that empowers broker-dealers to invest in pre-IPO companies through its platform GEM (Growth Equity Marketplace), recently announced the expansion of its executive leadership team with the appointments of Jonathan A. Clark, as President, USA, and Dan Sanders, as Executive Vice President, Private Markets. Together, these leaders will support its growth and further enhance its ability to provide sell-side broker-dealers access to the growing private markets.

“We are thrilled to welcome industry veterans Jonathan and Dan to the InvestX team,” said Marcus New, Founder and CEO. “They each bring years of experience, skills, integrity, and proven leadership that will help us continue to make a meaningful impact in the wealth management industry and to our broker-dealer clients as we work towards the electronification and democratization of the process for investing in pre-IPO companies. Together, these leaders will support the company’s growth and further enhance its ability to provide sell-side broker-dealers access to the insatiable demand for this asset class.”

Clark will manage InvestX’s go-to-market teams, leading efforts in client success and overall US operations. He brings over 30 years of experience spanning both the buy-side and the sell-side, former Co-Head of the Equity Trading desk of BlackRock’s America’s business, Clark then went on to lead Luminex, where he served most recently as CEO and President, responsible for launching and leading a dark equity pool alternative trading system (ATS) focused solely on block trading, which grew significantly under his leadership.

“As the private equity market has nearly tripled in the last decade, I’m excited to be joining a company that has been dedicated to expanding access to this elusive asset class since Day 1,” said Jonathan A. Clark, President, USA of InvestX. “Having been in the industry working on both the sell-side and buy-side, I was fascinated by how InvestX is solving unique challenges to investing in the private markets, offering low investment minimums and state-of-the-art trading technology. I look forward to contributing to the further growth of the company for years to come.”

Sanders, former Head of Execution Services in the Americas for Citi, where his responsibilities included running cash sales trading, electronic execution sales, portfolio trading, and platform sales, then went on to be the Head of Business Development in the Americas for Liquidnet, a global institutional investment network that connects asset managers with liquidity, will be responsible for securing key partners across multiple industries as well as identifying new investment opportunities, including sourcing shares both directly and through a network of contacts at venture capital and private equity firms, incubators/accelerators, and more. Sanders brings more than 25 years of finance, trading, equity, technology and sales experience and has built significant client relationships over the years.  

“After years in the public equity and fixed income markets, I am eager to join the undeniable growth in the private markets, hit the ground running by working with the team to spearhead this momentum and simultaneously identify additional investment opportunities along the way to accelerate InvestX’s long-term growth strategy,” said Dan Sanders, Executive Vice President, Private Markets at InvestX.  

In 2021, InvestX made new investments in the following notable companies: Impossible Foods, Kraken, Hootsuite, Udacity, DataStax, Scopely, Epic Games, Varo Bank, among others. Exited investments include Palantir, Airbnb, 23andMe, SoFi, Ginkgo Bioworks, etc. The company also announced a strategic acquisition from financial leaders Jefferies Financial Group Inc., Virtu Financial and Canaccord Genuity Group Inc., which is being used to advance its technology platform, increase back-office integration, and expand its footprint in the U.S. and Canada.