Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) (NYSE: ICE), parent of the New York Stock Exchange, is assessing Avalanche as a possible foundation for a regulated venue that would let tokenized US stocks and ETFs trade around the clock.
The first public signal came from Avalanche’s official account, which published remarks by Michael Blaugrund, ICE’s vice president of strategic initiatives.
Blaugrund said that as ICE compared networks for an alternative trading system now in development, Avalanche met many of the firm’s requirements and that ICE was working closely with the Avalanche team.
The comments were presented as part of an evaluation, not as a signed mandate.
ICE itself has not issued a matching press release confirming a selection.
Those remarks sit inside a larger NYSE digital-markets plan first outlined in January 2026.
ICE said then that it was building a platform for trading and on-chain settlement of tokenized securities, pending regulatory approval.
The design would keep NYSE’s Pillar matching engine at the center of order handling and attach blockchain rails for post-trade work.
BREAKING: NYSE plans to bring 24/7 trading on chain with their in-development ATS platform
“As we’ve evaluated different platforms, Avalanche checks a lot of those boxes for us, so we’re very engaged with the team”
– Michael Blaugrund of Intercontinental Exchange/NYSE pic.twitter.com/Ml9YSZtoCS
— Avalanche🔺 (@avax) September 17, 2026
The goals include continuous hours, faster finality than conventional T+1 settlement, dollar-sized orders, and funding through stablecoins.
Tokenized shares are meant to remain interchangeable with traditionally issued securities, not become a separate class of claim.
Subsequent partnership work has filled in other parts of that stack.
NYSE later named Securitize as the first digital transfer agent eligible to support issuer-sponsored tokens on the planned venue.
ICE also brought tZERO in as a design partner and arranged to use related patents.
Those steps show that chain choice is only one decision among several covering issuance, compliance, broker access, and clearing connectivity.
The architecture has also been described as able to support more than one network for settlement and custody, which leaves the process open rather than locked to a single chain.
Avalanche’s pitch for this kind of work is its ability to host custom Layer-1 networks with their own rule sets.
That matters for a securities ATS, where identity checks, permissioned participation, and audit trails are not optional extras.
Throughput, institutional wallet support, and links into existing market plumbing are also part of ICE’s review.
Blaugrund’s language suggests Avalanche currently scores well against that list while ICE continues to look at alternatives.
The commercial stakes are obvious.
US cash equities still trade on limited hours and settle through a chain of intermediaries built for an earlier market.
A regulated on-chain ATS could compress that cycle and keep books open through nights and weekends.
It would also test whether a high-volume exchange can keep investor protections while moving ownership records onto blockchain systems.
None of that is live.
There is no announced go-live date, no confirmed capital commitment tied to Avalanche, and no public ICE statement that a network has been chosen.
What the September 2026 comments do establish is narrower and still material: one of the world’s largest exchange operators is in active technical discussions with Avalanche after comparing platforms, and Avalanche is willing to put that engagement on the record. Until ICE names a chain, the story remains one of evaluation, not adoption.