Republicans latched on to a sweeping Texas initiative seeking to rival Wall Street, framing it as a pathway to upend the concentration of stock exchanges in New York, a Democratic stronghold. 

After the Texas Stock Exchange recently received approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) highlighted a message from President Donald Trump touting the Dallas-based startup as a financial loss for New York. 

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 The president “knows that Texas is the future of finance in America,” Abbott said Sunday evening.

In his message, Trump warned that New York stood to lose “Hundreds of Billions of Dollars” to the Texas Stock Exchange, which he said would be taking business away from the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.

As long as Democrats such as Attorney General Letitia James remain in power, “no company will move to New York, and few companies will be using the New York Stock Exchange, or NASDAQ, for going Public,” Trump added in a post to Truth Social. 

The Texas Stock Exchange is expected to open in early 2026 after the SEC approved its operation as the first new, fully integrated U.S. stock exchange in decades. The development places it in direct competition with the NYSE and Nasdaq as Texas seeks to offer investors a business-friendly alternative to New York. 

“[Firms] are prioritizing hiring in Dallas over hiring in New York in a lot of instances, which I think is a pretty unique shift,” Sasha Stratton, head of risk for Selby Jennings in Dallas, told the Texas Tribune. Stratton moved to the Lone Star State from New York five years ago to find a more affordable lifestyle that offered a higher quality of living.

“That’s driven by the availability of talent, the cost of operations, the availability of real estate, and with the Texas Stock Exchange and other exchanges following suit, realizing it’s not a compromise to be building out in Dallas, it’s actually a smart, strategic decision to take advantage of how booming the economy is,” she continued. 

The Texas Stock Exchange is backed by over $160 million from investors, including BlackRock and Citadel. 

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In a statement, Abbott heralded the exchange as an opportunity to “spur economic development and expand the financial might of our great state around the world.”

“Working together, we will make Texas stronger and more prosperous than ever before,” the governor said.