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PISCES Turns One With Six Auctions Across Five Companies Once All Four Operators Are Counted, Including a Live Trade Right Now

Writer: Shawn Jhanji
Shawn Jhanji
24 hours ago
4 min read
One year after the FCA licensed the London Stock Exchange to run PISCES, the picture is thinner on volume than the framework's backers hoped, but wider than a first look at any single operator suggests. Count all four approved venues together and PISCES has hosted at least six auctions across five companies, including one that is trading right now. The number that has circulated this week, four auctions across three companies, describes only the London Stock Exchange's own Private Securities Market, where Wayve, Moneybox and an ownership structure linked to Oxford Science Enterprises have traded. Oxford Science Enterprises has run its auctions quarterly; Wayve and Moneybox each treated theirs as a one-off event. That is a real number, but it is not the whole of PISCES, and reporting it as such understates a framework that now has four separate operators actively running auctions on different cadences. JP Jenkins, not the LSE, ran the very first PISCES auction of any kind. Board game maker QPLAY's order window opened on 18 March 2026 and uncrossed on 24 March, trading through approved intermediaries including Peel Hunt and Winterflood Securities, weeks before the LSE's own first PISCES trade. JP Jenkins has since focused its public PISCES activity on structuring rather than volume, most visibly through its Q3 Moving Markets conference with Ashurst Perkins Coie covering "PISCES & the JPJ Private Market", while its separate, continuously running matched bargain facility, which is not part of PISCES but sits alongside it, now carries more than 50 private and delisted companies with regular trading, evidence that the appetite for private share liquidity in the UK is broader than the PISCES auction count alone captures. Asset Match, the third operator, approved by the FCA in April 2026, brought real history into PISCES rather than starting from zero. Wiltshire brewer Wadworth & Co, which had already traded more than 300,000 A Ordinary Shares through quarterly auctions on Asset Match's existing venue since February 2023, opened its inaugural PISCES auction on 4 August 2026. The Designated Auction Period is open now and runs until 30 September 2026, meaning that as of today there is a live, ongoing PISCES trade that a headline count of "four auctions, three companies" simply misses. Vestd, approved as the fourth operator on 29 April 2026 and built to run without financial intermediaries, has not yet reported a completed PISCES auction, though its entry as a purpose-built equity management platform is itself a signal the framework is still attracting new infrastructure a year in. The structural issue is still the word intermittent. PISCES gives member firms wide latitude on how often to hold auctions, and outside Oxford Science Enterprises' quarterly rhythm and Wadworth's now-established pattern on Asset Match, most companies have used that latitude to hold as few auctions as possible. For any investor who buys in, the exit resembles a Hotel California problem: getting in is straightforward, finding a buyer for the next round is not. A slower IPO pipeline and wider macroeconomic uncertainty have kept many private companies content to sit still rather than commit to a trading calendar. The comparison that keeps coming up, and it is not a flattering one, is Goldman Sachs' GSTrUE platform, launched in 2007 with early commitments from Apollo and Oaktree that raised over a billion dollars in private equity capital before folding when secondary market makers never turned up; trading was reportedly conducted strictly by appointment before both anchor participants moved to public listings. PISCES has not failed the way GSTrUE eventually did, and the presence of four operators with genuinely different models, LSE's blue-chip PSM, JP Jenkins' broker network, Asset Match's long trading history, Vestd's intermediary-free approach, is a structural difference GSTrUE never had. Reports that JPMorgan is evaluating a role within the PISCES ecosystem would be the clearest signal yet that a major bank sees a path to making secondary turnover work rather than treating the venue as a curiosity. Why this matters beyond the auction count: PISCES is the piece of market infrastructure our SEIS and tokenisation coverage has repeatedly flagged as the mechanism that could compress the realistic liquidity horizon for early-stage UK shares, including SEIS and EIS-relieved holdings, from the traditional seven to ten years down to as little as three, without forfeiting tax relief, provided the first trading window lands at or beyond the three-year mark. That thesis depends on there being a buyer on the other side of the trade when a holder wants out. A fuller count, six auctions, five companies, four operators, one trade open today, is still thin against the scale of the UK's private company base, but data suggests the private company secondary market is set to grow considrably, and there is a stronger base case for that thesis than the LSE venue's numbers alone suggest. Key Takeaways Counting all four approved PISCES operators together, the framework has hosted at least six auctions across five companies in its first year JP Jenkins ran PISCES' first-ever auction, for board game maker QPLAY, in March 2026, weeks ahead of the LSE's own first trade. Asset Match has a live PISCES auction open right now: Wadworth & Co's Designated Auction Period runs until 30 September 2026, building on a trading history that predates PISCES by three years. Vestd, approved as the fourth operator in April 2026, has not yet reported a completed PISCES auction. The venue's overall pace still echoes Goldman Sachs' 2007 GSTrUE platform, though PISCES' four operators with genuinely different models is a structural difference GSTrUE never had, and reports suggest JPMorgan is assessing its own role. The fuller count strengthens, without proving, this publication's SEIS and tokenisation thesis that PISCES could compress early-stage UK shares' liquidity horizon from seven to ten years down to as little as three. Sources https://www.archyde.com/lse-pisces-will-the-private-securities-market-avoid-the-fate-of-goldmans-gstrue/ (LSE PSM figures, reporting on original City AM coverage) https://www.fca.org.uk/markets/pisces-private-intermittent-securities-capital-exchange-system https://jpjenkins.com/news/ (JP Jenkins auction and matched bargain facility activity) https://assetmatch.com/news/ar

One year after the FCA licensed the London Stock Exchange to run PISCES, the picture is thinner on volume than the framework's backers hoped, but wider than a first look at any single operator suggests. Count all four approved venues together and PISCES has hosted at least six auctions across five companies, including one that is trading right now.


The number that has circulated this week, four auctions across three companies, describes only the London Stock Exchange's own Private Securities Market, where Wayve, Moneybox and an ownership structure linked to Oxford Science Enterprises have traded. Oxford Science Enterprises has run its auctions quarterly; Wayve and Moneybox each treated theirs as a one-off event. That is a real number, but it is not the whole of PISCES, and reporting it as such understates a framework that now has four separate operators actively running auctions on different cadences.


JP Jenkins, not the LSE, ran the very first PISCES auction of any kind. Board game maker QPLAY's order window opened on 18 March 2026 and uncrossed on 24 March, trading through approved intermediaries including Peel Hunt and Winterflood Securities, weeks before the LSE's own first PISCES trade. JP Jenkins has since focused its public PISCES activity on structuring rather than volume, most visibly through its Q3 Moving Markets conference with Ashurst Perkins Coie covering "PISCES & the JPJ Private Market", while its separate, continuously running matched bargain facility, which is not part of PISCES but sits alongside it, now carries more than 50 private and delisted companies with regular trading, evidence that the appetite for private share liquidity in the UK is broader than the PISCES auction count alone captures.


Asset Match, the third operator, approved by the FCA in April 2026, brought real history into PISCES rather than starting from zero. Wiltshire brewer Wadworth & Co, which had already traded more than 300,000 A Ordinary Shares through quarterly auctions on Asset Match's existing venue since February 2023, opened its inaugural PISCES auction on 4 August 2026. The Designated Auction Period is open now and runs until 30 September 2026, meaning that as of today there is a live, ongoing PISCES trade that a headline count of "four auctions, three companies" simply misses.


Vestd, approved as the fourth operator on 29 April 2026 and built to run without financial intermediaries, has not yet reported a completed PISCES auction, though its entry as a purpose-built equity management platform is itself a signal the framework is still attracting new infrastructure a year in.


The structural issue is still the word intermittent. PISCES gives member firms wide latitude on how often to hold auctions, and outside Oxford Science Enterprises' quarterly rhythm and Wadworth's now-established pattern on Asset Match, most companies have used that latitude to hold as few auctions as possible. For any investor who buys in, the exit resembles a Hotel California problem: getting in is straightforward, finding a buyer for the next round is not. A slower IPO pipeline and wider macroeconomic uncertainty have kept many private companies content to sit still rather than commit to a trading calendar.


The comparison that keeps coming up, and it is not a flattering one, is Goldman Sachs' GSTrUE platform, launched in 2007 with early commitments from Apollo and Oaktree that raised over a billion dollars in private equity capital before folding when secondary market makers never turned up; trading was reportedly conducted strictly by appointment before both anchor participants moved to public listings.


PISCES has not failed the way GSTrUE eventually did, and the presence of four operators with genuinely different models, LSE's blue-chip PSM, JP Jenkins' broker network, Asset Match's long trading history, Vestd's intermediary-free approach, is a structural difference GSTrUE never had. Reports that JPMorgan is evaluating a role within the PISCES ecosystem would be the clearest signal yet that a major bank sees a path to making secondary turnover work rather than treating the venue as a curiosity.


Why this matters beyond the auction count: PISCES is the piece of market infrastructure our SEIS and tokenisation coverage has repeatedly flagged as the mechanism that could compress the realistic liquidity horizon for early-stage UK shares, including SEIS and EIS-relieved holdings, from the traditional seven to ten years down to as little as three, without forfeiting tax relief, provided the first trading window lands at or beyond the three-year mark.


That thesis depends on there being a buyer on the other side of the trade when a holder wants out. A fuller count, six auctions, five companies, four operators, one trade open today, is still thin against the scale of the UK's private company base, but data suggests the private company secondary market is set to grow considrably, and there is a stronger base case for that thesis than the LSE venue's numbers alone suggest.


Key Takeaways


  • Counting all four approved PISCES operators together, the framework has hosted at least six auctions across five companies in its first year

  • JP Jenkins ran PISCES' first-ever auction, for board game maker QPLAY, in March 2026, weeks ahead of the LSE's own first trade.

  • Asset Match has a live PISCES auction open right now: Wadworth & Co's Designated Auction Period runs until 30 September 2026, building on a trading history that predates PISCES by three years.

  • Vestd, approved as the fourth operator in April 2026, has not yet reported a completed PISCES auction.

  • The venue's overall pace still echoes Goldman Sachs' 2007 GSTrUE platform, though PISCES' four operators with genuinely different models is a structural difference GSTrUE never had, and reports suggest JPMorgan is assessing its own role.

  • The fuller count strengthens, without proving, this publication's SEIS and tokenisation thesis that PISCES could compress early-stage UK shares' liquidity horizon from seven to ten years down to as little as three.


Sources

https://jpjenkins.com/news/ (JP Jenkins auction and matched bargain facility activity)

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