The exchange caps a multi-faceted effort to attract companies and capital to the Lone Star State. Canada should take note
On the last Friday in July, the new Texas Stock Exchange (TXSE) in Dallas completed its rollout. It now carries every exchange-listed security in the United States, with the NYSE and Nasdaq squarely in its sights.
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A big and bold bet, in true Texas fashion.
But the exchange is not the biggest thing that was built. Its launch caps a years-long, multi-faceted effort to attract companies and capital to the Lone Star State. That is what should interest us here in Canada.
Texas has spent the past several years rewriting the rules that govern how corporations are formed, run and sued, making itself a serious rival to Delaware, where most large American companies have been legally domiciled for more than a century.
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These changes are not merely marketing with a Texas twang. They address what managers actually care about: predictability, efficiency and control. The state adopted a statutory presumption of good faith for directors and officers, let companies raise the thresholds for derivative suits and shareholder proposals and created a business court based on the Delaware model, with judges who specialize in corporate law.
The exchange was the last piece, and the legislature wrote it into the law itself. A Texas-incorporated company qualifies for the new shareholder-proposal thresholds either by keeping its head office in Texas or by listing on a Texas exchange. The pitch is not simply a place to trade shares. It is a package: incorporate here, litigate here, headquarter here, and finally, list here.
The business community has been receptive. The governor’s office counts roughly 200 major companies that have moved their head offices to Texas since 2020, including Chevron, Charles Schwab and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Texas now hosts more Fortune 500 headquarters than any other state. Some companies have gone further and moved their corporate charters to Texas, including Tesla, Exxon Mobil, SpaceX and Dell.
