Major stock exchanges are now stampeding and sprouting in Texas. And much more is coming.
DALLAS — The capital (center) of capital (money) is still New York City, home to the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq, by far the most valuable stock markets in the world.
“When you go to the New York Stock Exchange, it’s kind of where America was built”, said Edward Crawford, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Coltala Holdings, which is headquartered in Texas.
Texas, and specifically DFW, is opening up a major alternative to Wall Street, with what’s been dubbed Y’all Street.
And that is where Crawford believes the future of this country will be built.
“There are two financial capitals now in the U.S.,” he said. “There’s a great pride in Texas and there’s a lot of business owners that say … I’m private, but if I went public, I’d like to go public here.”
Major stock exchanges are now stampeding and sprouting in Texas to make it happen. The big banks have already arrived.
“It’s a second headquarters for many companies … like Goldman Sachs is a great example,” Crawford said. “There are more people from JP Morgan here than there are in New York.”
And much more is coming.
“I think you’re gonna see a massive amount of capital coming here, a massive amount of jobs and growth,” Crawford said. “I would look out for more exciting things to come. I think there’s gonna be surprises to the upside.”
Crawford was just named a founding member of the Advisory Board for NYSE Texas. That is the new Texas branch of the New York Stock Exchange, which rang its bell at AT&T Stadium for its kickoff here last year.
And just like in New York, it has familiar competition here from the new Nasdaq Texas, which had its rollout at the Alamo this month.
Taking on both of them is a totally new rival hoping to come online this year called the Texas Stock Exchange, which just put out an unsubtle ad featuring a Texas longhorn on home turf shattering the Wall Street bull.
TXSE has taken the tact that the two New York-based exchanges are a duopoly and were drawn to Texas not just by new opportunities, but also by the prospect that the well-funded upstart TXSE could lure away companies already selling stock on the big exchanges, and to sign up new companies here that aren’t selling stock yet.
WFAA asked Crawford if there is enough pie to go around, enough pent-up demand in Texas and the Southwest from companies that would want to go public and sell stock to raise money.
“Yeah, I think there is,” Crawford said. “If you look at the growth rates of Texas, there is enough for all three exchanges… or at least two of the exchanges to do well. A lot of it will depend on the continued growth of the state of Texas.”
NYSE Texas was the first of the three to set up shop here, and already has more than 100 companies listed, but those are dual listings. It already sells stock on the NYSE in New York.
When might we see new companies here going public with a stock exchange here in Texas?
“I think as businesses look at these exchanges in the next year or two, I think you might see a couple that are saying, ‘I would like to just go,'” Crawford said. “We’ve had interest to just go in Texas, as well as dual listings… I think it’ll be very interesting over the next two-to-three years to see how it shakes out.”
Much of it will get underway this year. It’s all happening at business-friendly Texas speed.
“Having done business in other different states and other different countries, including Dominican Republic, Haiti and Afghanistan, I can tell you the ability to get something done quickly and efficiently in the state of Texas is the fastest I’ve ever seen anywhere that I’ve lived on this planet,” Crawford said.
So, Texas is very business-friendly, but is it investor-friendly enough? Some critics have pointed out that, unlike in places such as New York, companies that go public here could silence retail shareholders who can’t afford to own the amount of stock Texas requires an investor to have before they can sue a company.
“If you look at the large private companies in Texas, which there are many that could be public, those companies have many out of state investors, many public investors, and many private equity investors that are funded through pension funds and large endowments,” Crawford said. “And those players fund into Texas because they know… it’s not just the Wild West here. We protect all the different constituencies. What we try to do is be more efficient with it and do the right thing and cut red tape that is not needed.”
We talked about a lot of things, including what’s going to change here in Texas when three major stock markets are here, and about the fact that NYSE Texas chose Trump Media as its first listing. WFAA asked whether there are any concerns that the move could signal that NYSE Texas is especially friendly to a certain political leaning instead of being just a down-the-middle, results-oriented exchange.
Crawford’s answer to that, and our whole conversation, is here:
