"Negotiations aren't final but we are focusing on that address," company spokesperson Mike DeMeo tells GlobeSt.com, adding, "A little more than 120 Nasdaq employees will be moving into 1500 Broadway." The firm currently has 127 employees working in its Downtown offices. No timeframe for the move has been released and details of the lease are being kept under wraps but Nasdaq is said to be negotiating a long-term deal on four floors at the 33-story tower.

Still unclear is what is in store for the two floors at Brookfield Properties' One Liberty Plaza that Nasdaq occupies under a sublease from its parent company, the National Association of Securities Dealers. Nasdaq is "currently in the process of splitting off from NASD," a Nasdaq spokesperson said yesterday. The company relocated from Washington to the 160,000-sf NASD sublet as part of the breakup, but company officials say the One Liberty Plaza sublet was a stopgap measure and that a permanent Midtown headquarters was never in doubt. NASD leases 230,000 sf on five floors at One Liberty under a long-term agreement with Brookfield. A Brookfield spokesperson would not comment on the deal.

Following the post-Sept. 11 evacuation of One Liberty Plaza, which is located across the street from the World Trade Center site, Nasdaq moved its Downtown staff to temporary quarters in Connecticut and New Jersey. In December, the firm announced that it would return to Lower Manhattan on a short-term basis while it searched for Midtown space. However, Nasdaq officials are quick to stress that the move is completely unrelated to the terrorist attacks and that plans for a relocation to Midtown were in the works long before Sept. 11. "The reason to be in Midtown is to be close to the MarketSite, where many of the Nasdaq events are held" company spokesperson Judy Inosanto tells GlobeSt.com.