SMARTTRADE TECHNOLOGIES acquired by TA ASSOCIATES

smartTrade Technologies has acquired kACE Financial to create a unified, multi-asset trading and payments platform. This transformational acquisition combines smartTrade’s low-latency SaaS infrastructure with kACE’s specialized expertise in FX derivatives and complex pricing analytics. The strategic rationale is to address the market's increasing demand for a single, integrated workflow that handles everything from simple spot trading to sophisticated structured products. Following the recent investment from TA Associates, this deal represents a major step in smartTrade's innovation roadmap, specifically accelerating its transition to a fully cloud-native, AI-driven offering. The merger allows the combined group to leverage a global infrastructure and an expanded technical team to deliver lower total cost of ownership (TCO) for its international banking and brokerage clients.

Hg has acquired a majority stake in smartTrade Technologies, facilitating the exit of minority shareholders Keensight Capital and Pléiade Venture. CEO and co-founder David Vincent, along with the broader management team, reinvested alongside Hg to maintain a significant stake in the business. The strategic rationale for the transaction was to accelerate smartTrade’s global expansion—particularly in Asia—and to strengthen its R&D capabilities in automated trading. Under Keensight’s five-year tenure, the company doubled its revenues while maintaining high profitability, leading to a successful "5x money" return for the exiting fund. This investment represents Hg’s 7th deal in the capital markets technology sector, underscoring its commitment to backing high-growth, technically advanced financial software platforms.