Financial terms of the Vinyl Equity deal were not disclosed. But the purchase gives the bank an in-house transfer agent for share transfer, which can be complicated when a company goes public.

Morgan Stanley has agreed to acquire Vinyl Equity, a fintech that digitizes the traditionally manual job of transferring shares between companies and their shareholders, the bank announced Monday.

Financial terms of the deal, which is set to close in the first quarter of 2027, were not disclosed. However, a Morgan Stanley spokesperson told Bloomberg the integration would cost $65 million over a couple of years.

The acquisition means Morgan Stanley won’t have to enlist a third-party transfer agent for cap table management, equity administration or share transfer – which can be complicated, for example, when a company goes public.

“Private markets are playing an increasingly important role in wealth management as companies stay private for longer and value is created outside the public markets,” Jed Finn, the head of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, said in a statement Monday. “As these companies grow larger and more complex, the infrastructure must keep pace when they enter the public markets.”

Simultaneously, Finn said, “blockchain technology, atomic settlement and tokenization are reshaping the industry.”

“As part of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management’s private-to-public platform, Vinyl's digital-first technology will help us advance how ownership is recorded, transferred and managed,” Finn said.

Scott Whatley, head of Morgan Stanley at Work, told Bloomberg the bank’s clients had been “asking for help in solving what is really an antiquated technology” and added that the Vinyl deal provides a “natural synergy” that would remove “a lot of friction.”

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