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The fledgling Texas Stock Exchange said Tuesday it has raised $120 million from investors including BlackRock and Citadel Securities with the aim of launching a new national rival to the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.
TXSE Group has raised capital from more than two dozen investors and “prominent business leaders from across the country” in hopes of becoming “the most highly capitalized stock exchange participant” to gain recognition from federal regulators, James Lee, its president and CEO. Posted on LinkedIn Tuesday evening.
Lee said the exchange will be headquartered in Dallas.
The Wall Street Journal first mentioned It launched on the Texas Stock Exchange under the leadership of Lee, a longtime financial expert in the state, and plans to begin transacting its first trading in 2025 and make its first listing in 2026.
A Citadel Securities spokesman confirmed that the trading firm supports TXSE but declined to comment further. BlackRock declined to comment.
The exchange describes itself on website As a “fully electronic national securities exchange” it will be home to public companies and the growing exchange-traded fund industry, which has raised $8.6 trillion by challenging the dominance of the much larger U.S. mutual fund market.
Texas is increasingly seeking to reshape itself as a center for corporate finance. The state last year enacted a law to create the Texas Business Court as a venue for business cases with more than $5 million at stake, creating an alternative to existing corporate law points in New York and Delaware.
The latter remains by far the preferred state of incorporation for large companies. But Delaware’s position has been targeted by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, whose $56 billion stock pay package has been challenged in a Delaware state court.
The Texas Stock Exchange faces an uphill battle in challenging the dominant New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq, the two largest players in the US stock trading market. BlackRock, Citadel Securities, and several other major U.S. financial institutions have previously supported new markets such as the Member Exchange.
