Steve Cohen invests in 24/7 stock exchange startup

Hedge fund executive Steve Cohen is putting his dollars into a new venture seeking to launch a 24/7 stock exchange.

According to a CNBC report, Cohen”™s Stamford-based Point72 Ventures is leading a $14 million funding round for 24 Exchange, a Bermuda-based crypto and foreign exchange trading platform. The new endeavor would pose a challenge to the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ platforms that operate weekdays from 9:30 a.m. ET and end at 4:00 p.m.

24 Exchange is being created in response to the new wave of younger retail investors who began trading during the Covid-19 pandemic and made their presence known through their advocacy of so-called meme stocks for AMC Entertainment Holdings and GameStop.

“The same people that trade cryptocurrencies started to trade more stocks because of the GameStop movement and the overall participation of retail that [has] increased significantly,” said Dmitri Galinov, founder and CEO of 24 Exchange. “If Elon Musk tweets something on Saturday, people would want to buy or sell Tesla stock.”

24 Exchange filed a draft application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to approve 24-hour trading, and Galinov is expecting a decision from the agency in the summer of 2022. He added that his company is looking ahead to securitizing digital assets that are not currently under the SEC”™s regulation, including cryptocurrency and non-fungible assets.