New York Fintech Expands to North Texas with New Hires

With boots on the ground, a New York-based fintech is expanding its presence to North Texas.

Clear Street, a company that says it’s building a better infrastructure for capital markets with a cloud-based trading platform, announced making three new director-level hires to its prime brokerage sales and trading team in the region, as it looks to expand its services and attract new clients locally.

“Expanding our operations into Dallas, and bringing on top industry talent, continues to give Clear Street an edge in supporting our rapidly growing roster of prime brokerage clients,” said Chris Pento, Clear Street co-founder and CEO, in a statement.

Meet the new hires

Joining the startup’s team of around 300 are Dean Mele, Dallas branch manager and managing director of sales and trading; Mark Hall, managing director of sales and trading; and Danny Shapiro, director of sales and trading. Before joining Clear Street, Mele served as an equity trader at National Securities Corporation. Hall’s experience as an equity trader includes stints at Fidelity Investments, Capital Institutional Services, and WFG Capital Markets. Shapiro most recently served as the VP of equity sales at Citigroup, after holding a similar position at Credit Suisse.

While Clear Street doesn’t have a permanent space in the region, a spokesperson for the company said the three are currently working out of a shared office space in Plano. They added that Clear Street’s expansion to North Texas, which they described as a “priority market,” was spurred by demand for the company’s services, in addition to better serving the “institution clients” the company currently serves here. Names of those clients were not disclosed.

Clear Street also has offices in San Diego, Chicago, Tel Aviv, and Saint Thomas.

Plans to expand

Clear Street was formed in 2018 and launched its platform the following year. The company’s platform provides access to things like execution, financing, clearing, and custody services for U.S. equities and options trading. In the last year, the company says it has hit a number of milestones. In February, Clear Street COO Andy Volz wrote in a Medium post that the company’s annual revenue rose by more than 14% in 2021, as its platform reached more than 1,000 users, processing an average of $3 billion in trades per day.

“In the past 12 months, we’ve made significant strides in building out our prime brokerage platform, providing a best-in-class, technology-first experience to our clients,” Pento said.

Looking ahead, the spokesperson said Clear Street will look to expand its service offering in the area to include to capital introductions. They added that the company will be expanding to new regions in the coming year, while likely adding new team members in North Texas. Pending that growth, the company could potentially consider establishing a more permanent footprint in the region.

“We’re at a pivotal moment in Clear Street’s journey as we expand our network and bring new products and services to market,” said Joseph Ricardi, head of sales and trading at Clear Street, in a statement. “Bringing on top sales and trading talent is essential in helping us continue to provide exceptional service to our diverse customer base.”