Wall Street gains direct oversight of Web3 security as S&P Global buys OpenZeppelin

S&P Global has agreed to acquire smart contract security company OpenZeppelin in a transaction that would put the crypto company inside the group that includes S&P Global Ratings.

The transaction remains subject to closing conditions, S&P Global's announcement said. Financial terms were not disclosed, and S&P said it does not expect the deal to materially affect its financial results.

Future Contracts versions will also stay open source, and OpenZeppelin extended that commitment to its other open-source applications and tools.

OpenZeppelin says more than $37 trillion in value has been transferred through its Contracts software since 2015.

The current OpenZeppelin Contracts repository uses the MIT License, which grants broad rights to use, copy, modify, and distribute the software. Separately, OpenZeppelin said released versions will remain open source permanently and cannot be withdrawn.

S&P says OpenZeppelin would keep its name and operate as its own business unit after closing. Demian Brener would continue leading the company and report to Yann Le Pallec, president of S&P Global Ratings.

OpenZeppelin also said its security audits, engineering work and ecosystem programs will continue with the same team. The announced change is access to S&P's research capacity, market data, institutional reach and additional resources.

That would add smart contract security expertise to S&P's institutional risk and data operations without changing the public availability of OpenZeppelin's code.

OpenZeppelin's current terms of service permit certain changes to paid or hosted plans, including pricing, features, quotas and usage limits, with protections and notice depending on the type of change.

For customers, the announcement makes specific continuity promises about audits, engineering work, ecosystem programs and open-source code. It does not make the same promise about every price, product feature or usage limit.

Until closing, OpenZeppelin remains the subject of a pending acquisition agreement, not an S&P business unit. If the deal closes as announced, the main change for users would be corporate ownership and access to S&P's data, research, and institutional distribution, while OpenZeppelin says its public code and core client work will continue.

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