Board games maker to be first private company traded under UK’s ‘Pisces’ system

A board games developer will become the first private company to list on a new breed of exchange aimed at boosting London’s capital markets.

QPlay will use a trading platform operated by JP Jenkins, which has beaten the London Stock Exchange to attract the first listing on a private markets exchange under the new Private Intermittent Securities and Capital Exchange (Pisces) regime.

The system was launched in June 2025 as a way to buy and sell stakes in private companies and part of a government initiative to bolster the UK’s capital markets.

UK chancellor Rachel Reeves has said the Pisces system would “reinvigorate the UK’s capital markets” by allowing employees, investors and founders in private companies to sell their stock on exchanges during limited trading windows.

It is hoped it will encourage companies to eventually list their shares in London and get investors more excited about UK stocks.

The LSE gained approval from the Financial Conduct Authority last August to run its private share-trading platform, followed three months later by JP Jenkins, a British company that has long facilitated the trading of shares in unlisted companies.

JP Jenkins said the option to sell shares on Pisces “allows founders and early-stage investors to make controlled, partial exits, facilitates the recycling of capital and also offers a valuable alternative to trade sale and IPOs”.

QPlay has more than 5mn players online and is the maker of Outsmarted, which it says is the UK’s best-selling board game with more than 1mn copies sold.

It is owned by Velocity Capital EIS and its shares will be listed on JP Jenkins’ platform on March 18. Investors will be able to buy and sell stakes in the private company until March 24.

The LSE has said its first private markets trade will take place on March 25 with investment company Tradable Private Equity. The trade will take place through a vehicle that holds shares in Oxford Science Enterprises, rather than via a listing of shares in the life sciences venture capital firm itself.

Both ministers and the LSE had hoped a Pisces listing would take place in 2025 following the launch, but it has taken time for companies to have the confidence to consider using the new system.

One person familiar with the battle to get a business to list on Pisces said there had been “a long queue of companies willing to go second”.

Stuart Nice, founder and chief executive of QPlay, said: “We are naturally excited about this next stage of growth and look forward to leading the way for other great British companies who can now realise the benefits of offering their stock on the JP Jenkins Private Market.”

However, some market commentators have raised concerns about the lack of disclosures required by companies and how market abuse laws will not apply.