The Charles Schwab Corp. has agreed to buy TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. in an all-stock deal valued at roughly $26 billion. It will eventually result in moving the combined company’s headquarters to North Texas.

Both San Francisco-based Schwab and Nebraska-based TD Ameritrade already have major campuses in North Texas, with Schwab finishing up a 1 million-square-foot regional campus on the Circle T Ranch in Westlake, and TD Ameritrade having recently completed its own regional campus in nearby Southlake.

“We have long respected TD Ameritrade since our early days pioneering the discount brokerage industry, and as a fellow advocate for investors and independent investment advisors,” Schwab President and CEO Walt Bettinger said in a statement. “Together, we share a passion for breaking down barriers for investors and advisors through a combination of low cost, great service, and technology.”

Both companies started out more than 40 years ago as alternatives to traditional Wall Street brokerages. 

With the announced acquisition, TD Ameritrade’s board of directors said it has suspended its previously disclosed CEO search, naming Stephen Boyle, TD Ameritrade EVP and CFO, as its interim president and CEO, effective immediately.

TD Ameritrade opened its 300,000-square-foot Regional Financial Center in January 2018, bringing with it roughly 1,600 employees. The facility sits on 78 acres of land a couple miles from Schwab’s large regional campus under construction in Westlake.

The Schwab campus in Westlake. [Image: Courtesy Corgan]

Schwab has roughly doubled the size of its Westlake campus, which will eventually house about 7,000 workers on the 70-acre lakeside site at state highways 114 and 170 in northern Tarrant County. The company also has employment centers in El Paso and Austin.

“Partnering with Schwab on this transformative opportunity makes the right strategic and financial sense for TD Ameritrade,” Boyle said. “We share a common history—a journey since 1975 that has made Wall Street more accessible and financial dreams more attainable for millions of Americans.”

Officials in Westlake see the announcement as a confirmation of its place in the North Texas business community.

“Schwab’s announcement solidifies the notion that Westlake is in fact the financial hub of DFW and perhaps the entire country. We welcome them to our community and hope others look at Westlake as a place to do business in the future. We are incredibly thankful to be at the center of this seismic marriage between two financial giants,” Westlake Town Manager Amanda DeGan said in a release.

Schwab said the acquisition will allow it to continue to further scale on top of its organic growth, helping to drive sustainable, profitable growth and long-term value creation.

An eventual move by Schwab would follow another exit to North Texas by a prominent Bay Area company. McKesson relocated to Irving earlier this year from San Francisco.

Get on the list.
Dallas Innovates, every day.

Sign up to keep your eye on what’s new and next in Dallas-Fort Worth, every day.