Caplight was founded in 2021 to enable investors to hedge, generate income or take long and short positions on private company stock using structured products and synthetics. The company’s goal is to bring public equity market-like transaction data, execution, and settlement mechanics to the private markets. In doing so, Caplight will allow many large institutional investors to access the private markets for the first time. The company was founded by Javier Avalos and Justin Moore, who were early employees at Forge Global, a marketplace for buying and selling pre-IPO shares. In their time at Forge, Javier oversaw the company’s Marketplace business while Justin spearheaded much of the early technology development.
November 6, 2025 – The Charles Schwab Corporation announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Forge Global Holdings, Inc. in a transaction valued at approx. US$660m.
