The Rise of LP Secondaries with Jeff Leathers of Tap

Liquidity for investing in Venture Capital has been a recurring topic lately. Outsized rewards from investing in early-stage companies come when you hold until an IPO or other liquidity event. But life happens and that sometimes requires LPs to sell early and as more retail investors look into becoming Venture Investors, new ways to find liquidity will become the norm.

Our guest today is an expert in secondary markets for LPs, a friend of the Pod Jeff Leathers, Co-Founder and CEO of Tap, a platform designed to help facilitate secondary market sales for LP stakes in PE and Venture Capital funds.

About Jeff Leathers:Jeff Leathers is the Co-Founder and CEO of Tap. Before Tap, Jeff started and led the SPV and Fund Formations businesses at Carta. He previously held Product roles at fintech companies, including Quovo (acquired by Plaid) and Bloomberg. He received his MBA from Wharton.

In this episode we discuss:

(01:42) Jeff’s career and journey to Co-Founding Tap(04:03) Problems he helped GPs and LPs solve while at Carta(06:23) Why he went out and founded Tap(08:21) Differences between LP secondaries and direct secondaries(10:14) Why the time is right for more secondary markets for LPs(11:55) Problems that can occur in secondary markets(14:17) Why GPs can be resistant to secondary markets(15:29) How Tap’s approach is different in the market(17:56) What are stapled transactions(18:37) Defining industry terms like tender offers, continuation, and vehicles(21:45) Making sure deals comply with regulations(23:58) What Jeff is seeing in the market right now(26:47) What’s driving the secondary market(27:45) The biggest challenges for Tap and secondary markets(30:21) What secondary buyers are looking for(34:22) The role of technology in secondary markets(37:15) Tap’s business model(39:40) Advice to LPs and GPs looking at the secondary market(41:03) Jeff’s vision for the secondary market’s future

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