This week, former Reserve Bank of India governor Raghuram Rajan weighs in on Fed Chair Powell's remarks at the Fed's annual conference Jackson Hole. And, a look at the wealthiest county in the US - how do billionaires coexist with cowboy culture and the local community in Teton County? Plus, Chevron CEO Mike Wirth on the role of fossil fuels in the energy transition. Later, from Wall Street to "Y’all Street" - what Dallas is doing to attract financial firms and workers.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
This is Wall Street Week. I'm David Weston bringing you
stories of capitalism. When FED officials made their way to
Jackson Hole this week, they were helping support the richest
county in the country. We look at how it got
that way and what it tells us about the rest
of the US economy. Plus, it turns out that news
of the death of fossil fuels was greatly exaggerated. We
(00:42):
talk with Chevron chairman and CEO Mike Worth about the
future of his industry and how his big acquisition of
Hess sets his company up for what comes next. And
Wall Street, or at least part of it, may be
moving south. No, not to Miami, but to Dallas. What
is the city doing to the financial sector and how
far does it have to go to catch New York.
(01:04):
But we start with those FED meetings in Jackson Hall
and Chair Powell's remarks for a review, We turned a
former governor of the Reserve Bank of India, Raghuram Rajen
now at Chicago's Booth School.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Well, this was a very finely balanced speech.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
I think he had to emphasize that the FED is
still looking for more data At the same time, he
had to acknowledge the fact that, you know, there's a
lot of pressure on the FED to essentially acquiesce to
the government and cut raids. So he had to nod
(01:42):
to both sides, saying, the FED will do what it
has to do, but it's not ignoring the government.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And there that's why I.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Think it was actually quite masterful the way he managed
to sway expectations but slightly more towards a cut, but
with a subtle change in words. What he said was,
and I'm going to read this, the shifting balance of
risks may warrant adjusting our policy stunts.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Note the word me.
Speaker 4 (02:16):
That means he's not committing to it, but he's saying
we're bending a little more towards cutting in September.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
So that balance of risk shifting, I think towards the
possibility of cut. I think specifically with respect to labor.
And he did talk about the balance of risk on
labor tilting to the downside, even as inflation risks is
the upside. What's your take on the shape of the
US labor market today.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
Well, it does look like it's softening now, you know,
you don't see layoffs in a big way. Yet, what
you do see is the base of hiring has been
relatively slow, and partly because of the fact that immigration
has come down a lot, the labor force is not
(03:03):
growing so much. So even with the low pace of hiring,
you're not seeing unemployment go up. What that means, I
think from his perspective is that labor market is weak
enough that he doesn't see a substantial increase because of
second round effects of inflation. Now, this is central banks
(03:26):
speak for saying, look, TIFFs are going to push inflation up,
but what we really worry about is the worker asking
for higher wages, which creates more inflation down the line.
He discounted that in his speech, saying he doesn't see
that that will push inflation up because labor market, the
(03:49):
labor market is relatively weak at this point.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
At the same time, we do have core inflation that's
well above that two percent target that he reiterated once again,
what was the last time that the Federal Reserve cut
rates with the core inflation at that level.
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Well, it's not just that it has that it is
at that level, it is that it hasn't budged downwards
for quite some time. In fact, the last readings looked
like they're going upwards. That was the point where I
concluded that he was being quite dubvish, because there's no
mention of the fact that we haven't seen a downward
(04:30):
adjustment in inflation. Typically central banks cut when they see
inflation coming down. That puts a lot of weight on
weakness in the labor market, bringing inflation down further into
the Fed's comfort zone. There is no evidence for that
at this point. It is a hope.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
We have ambiguous or even conflicting data on inflation on
the one hand, labor on the other. And that's against
the backdrop of a fair amount of uncertainty, particularly uncertainty
because the Trump administration is really quite explicitly trying to
change the narrative, particularly with tariffs. What about the risk
of tariffs. How much of have we seen? How much
of a risk is suppose?
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Well, we haven't seen a lot.
Speaker 4 (05:15):
Though one should note and chair out noted that goods
inflation which was coming down, actually it was not inflation.
Goods prices were coming down, so inflation was negative. That
has shifted around to a positive rate of inflation on goods.
We still haven't seen a full pass through of the
(05:38):
tariffs into prices that is coming, and the chair said, look,
we think it is going to be a one off.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
What we worry about.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Is it either feeding into inflationary expectations, that is, people
think inflation is going to be higher, or it leads
into wages through a tight labor market. He discounted the
tight labor market issue, but he said inflationary expectations. We're
going to be watching that and we certainly will do
(06:11):
what it takes to keep inflationary expectations anchored. Broadly, he
seemed to suggest that tariffs were manageable. What he didn't
talk about, as we've said before, is that he didn't
talk about the fact that inflation is way higher than
the FED should be comfortable with.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
As you noted, Professor, he was very careful in saying
that the shifting risks may won't not necessarily, but may
warrant an adjustment. At the same time, the markets certainly
took it as almost a guarantee in September, there's going
to be a cut given where all the data are.
And what he had to say, what do you think
the FED should be doing.
Speaker 3 (06:50):
Well?
Speaker 4 (06:51):
I think he's bought the FED some room. What will
be critical. Are the August labor market numbers. They look
as weak as the July numbers looked. The Fed will
have a cost iron case for cutting. If, however, you
see again a shift back towards higher employment numbers, I
(07:15):
think the FED will really be conflicted at that point.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
The part of Chairpal's speech that got the most attention,
certainly for the market, was the part about what's likely
to happen in September where we are on cutting. But
there was another half of the speech which had to
do with the so called framework, which the FED tends
to revisit every five years or so, and of course
last time was August of twenty twenty. It was a
very different world. As he noted in his speech. What
(07:43):
did you take about what he had to say about
how they're changing that framework, Well.
Speaker 4 (07:48):
It was very interesting. He essentially said, we were tackling
a problem which no longer is that important, which was
the fact that the Fed had been tackling low inflation
for a long time. Inflation was lower than where the
FED wanted it to be, and the Fed essentially was
(08:09):
at what they call the effective lower bound. It couldn't
cut interest rates anymore, and in that kind of environment. Really,
the objective of the framework that the FED brought in
then was to push inflation up. And just a few
months after they brought that new framework in in twenty twenty,
(08:30):
the problem was exactly the opposite, which is high inflation,
and the FED now had to bring inflation down.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
And essentially what Chair Paul.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Said was, look, you know, we had the right framework
for the wrong problem, and at this point what we're
trying to do is move back to our old framework.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And finally, Professor, this was his last speech by all
appearances at Jackson Hole. As he noted his eighth straight speech,
I will reflect on his legacy and particularly I really
remember it wasn't that long ago we were talking about
hard landing, soft landing, a lot of people saying we're
gonna have to have a recession. In retrospect, it looks
like the soft landing happened under his watch.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
Well, yes, and I think unfortunately he will not get
as much credit as he should for navigating the FED
through very difficult times towards what seemed like a soft
landing at the beginning of this year. Of course, the
volatility from the new administration's policies has put that into
(09:44):
some question. But from the Fed's perspective, after the sort
of mistake that was made in the early days of
the pandemic in thinking the inflation then would be transitory,
the FED did a very credit job in getting things
back into line. So one he should get more credit
(10:06):
for that. The second I think is that he's displayed
immense calm and equanimity at a time when the FED
has been pummeled by outside forces. I think that's that's
also very creditable that he has led the FED from
(10:28):
the front, but also shown that, you know, despite all
the pressures from outside, he can focus and and offer
a reasonable view of what a central bank should do.
That may also, in the years to come be seen
as a very important legacy. He's led with honor, and
(10:52):
he's been very very careful, but also uh, you know,
reflected great in digrity while leading the FED.
Speaker 5 (11:04):
Up.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Next, we take a closer look at the wealthiest county
and the wealthiest country in the world and how it
got there. This is a story about America the beautiful,
and how the beauty of one particular part of America
is way more than just skin deep. Once a year,
(11:25):
Jackson how Wyoming is a monetary policy mecca, but the
resort town in Teetan County is a symbol of the
way wealth transforms some parts of a town and how
other parts may never change. Michael McKee tells us why.
Speaker 6 (11:41):
The wealthiest place in America today is a long way
from New York or San Francisco. It's much more famous
for its mountains, it's bison, and it's cowboys, than it
is for its billionaires. The residents would prefer to keep
it that way, but they would also tell you that
things are changing here fast.
Speaker 7 (12:03):
Me personally, my home has doubled in value in the
last three years, so my balance sheet is looking good,
but my income certainly hasn't doubled in the last three years.
Speaker 6 (12:13):
Jonathan Scheckter runs a think tank and sits on the
town council in Jackson, Wyoming, not far from the hotel
that hosts FED Chair J Powell and Central bankers from
around the world every summer.
Speaker 7 (12:24):
If you go back and look at Jackson Hall, historically
we are a high, isolated mountain valley in the northwest
corner of Wyoming. It's been very hard to get here
and very hard to get out, or once you're here.
Speaker 6 (12:37):
The result an economic transformation over two centuries, from trapping
to ranching to tourism, as the community's isolation and rugged
landscape eventually became a selling point for visitors. All right,
that's what I like to hear.
Speaker 7 (12:52):
People would come to visit the national park. All of
Grand Teton National Park in the southern half of Yellowstone
are within our county. And then in the early nineteen
six the Jackson Hall Ski Area got started, and that
got started actually with a federal government loan that was
intended for the most impoverished areas in America because we
didn't have anything but a summer economy. The geographic isolation
(13:15):
still really affects who we are, our ecosystem, our community,
our sense of who we are, but it has much
less effect on our economy. So now we have people
from around the world who come and live here part
time full time. They work from anywhere, so we've really
become a hub of remote work.
Speaker 6 (13:34):
For decades, it was New York County, which is primarily
the island of Manhattan, that led the country in wealth accumulation,
but in the early two thousands, Teeton County jumped into
the lead. That trend has rapidly accelerated in recent years,
and New York has tumbled into fourth place since the pandemic. Today,
the average per capita income in Teeton County is about
(13:56):
a half million dollars a year.
Speaker 7 (13:58):
Where the wealthiest county, the wealthiest country in the history
of the world. We also sit at the heart of
the greatest intact ecosystem in the lower forty eight And
if you think about things through the eyes of sustainability,
where you have ecological capital, financial capital, and human capital,
I don't think there's any place in the world that
(14:18):
could compare to here.
Speaker 6 (14:20):
Jonathan and others say it is no coincidence that a
singular ecosystem and a singular economy go hand in hand.
About ninety seven percent of the land in Teton County
is publicly owned, dedicated to parks and forests, and among
those who can afford to live anywhere on the planet,
there seems to be a belief that something is special
(14:40):
about this territory. But then again, there are plenty of
other spectacular places in America, so natural beauty is just
one piece of the puzzle here. Another is the tax system.
Speaker 7 (14:53):
Phrases we are an onshore, offshore tax haven, and so
we are hands down the most wealth friendly and income
friendly and wealth preservation friendly state in the Union. No
other state comes close.
Speaker 6 (15:10):
Low property tax, low sales tax, and zero income tax
in Wyoming are strong incentives. But then again, every other
county in the state benefits from the same friendly tax regime,
and their annual incomes are much closer to the national average.
Titan County leaves the others in the dust. So what's
(15:31):
the secret ingredient? If it's not just the land or
the taxes, maybe it's something else altogether. When in doubt,
ask the locals.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
It was a small town. Everybody knew everybody here in
this town. At one time it was extremely Western.
Speaker 6 (15:48):
Philip Wilson is the great grandson of Sylvester Wilson, who
was the first settler to bring his family to the
valley in the late eighteen hundreds. The town, five miles
west of Jackson, still bears his surname. Today, Philip and
his family run the Jackson Hole Rodeo, and he says
a lot has changed here even within his lifetime.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
When I was younger, basically everybody had cattle ranchers, few
dude ranchers around, but not a lot of them, and
then the hotel started coming in and torror started coming in.
Everybody that comes to Jackson Hole immediately falls in love
with it, wants a piece of it. We want to
have them feel part of Jackson Hole when you're here.
(16:30):
We want them to feel that the atmosphere. That's why
adhere to Rodeo. I even go out in the parking
and welcome people that come in. I turn around and
shake their hand when they leave.
Speaker 6 (16:42):
For Philip Wilson, his family and so many of the
other residents, the cowboy culture is not just for show.
They were born into it. But he also says it's
no wonder that culture appeals to outsiders and newcomers.
Speaker 5 (16:55):
That's what draws people to Jackson Hole. The people that
are here are friendly type people. They're outgoing, near friendly.
That's the only way they know how to be because
that's the way they run their lives.
Speaker 8 (17:08):
It's a very very popular. I think it's made into
a lot of the must visit when you come to
Jackson Hole type of places.
Speaker 6 (17:14):
Among those drawn here by the land and the culture
is Kate Moore. Low taxes aren't a motivation for her.
She still files in New York, where her work is
based as chief Investment Officer for City Private Bank. She's
joined a growing group of people making the move from
Wall Street to the West.
Speaker 8 (17:32):
I bought my house a little over seven years ago,
so pre COVID, which was excellent timing given real estate prices.
But I've been coming out here for thirty years. My
first trip was when I was in high school.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
Actually, now your job is essentially on Park Avenue, but
you're splitting your time here.
Speaker 8 (17:47):
Yeah, I split my time, and I split my time
in my previous role as well. But I think you know,
I'm someone who manages a global team. We're not all
in the same location at all times anyway, and you know,
if I'm working the appropriate hours in this case East
Coast market hours, I'm up at four, which is can
be a little bit tough. I think a lot of
the finance people in town do the same thing.
Speaker 6 (18:07):
More says there's also a deep appreciation for the region's
history here. She herself lives in a renovated cabin that
was built in nineteen twenty nine.
Speaker 3 (18:15):
But whether the.
Speaker 6 (18:16):
Homes are new or old, one look at real estate
prices will give you an idea of just how high
the peaks of wealth in Teton County can go.
Speaker 9 (18:25):
Our supply is limited here, but demand seems to go
up every year.
Speaker 6 (18:31):
Brandon Spackman is a local real estate agent and he
currently has the listing for the most expensive property in
the area. That's where we met up with him for
a tour. It seems like you have almost an unlimited
supply of buyers.
Speaker 8 (18:47):
We do.
Speaker 9 (18:47):
It's a big investment, and a lot of it is
just per timing in their lives and what they want
to do.
Speaker 6 (18:54):
When he says big investment, he means it. The river
House sits on a thirty six acre property in Wilson, Wyoming,
the town founded by Philip Wilson's great grandfather. It's about
ten miles from downtown Jackson and is currently listed at
sixty million dollars. Obviously, you have a room like this,
You walk into the room and it helps sell the house.
(19:16):
You want to live in a place like this. Now,
how many houses are in this price.
Speaker 9 (19:21):
Range over twenty million. A lot of properties are in
the twentieth thirty range.
Speaker 6 (19:27):
Properties like river House form the higher end of the
range in a place where private land is hard to
come by. But as the ultra premium market goes up,
so does the rest of it. Some people here say
that billionaires are pushing out the millionaires, not to mention
those in lower income brackets who sometimes commute from across
the border in Idaho. And Jonathan Scheckter thinks the wealth
(19:49):
divide could become a bigger problem under the latest federal legislation.
You're number one in per capita income, but also number
one in income disparity.
Speaker 7 (20:00):
Yes, we have roughly ninety percent of our income. A
little north of that is earned by the highest earners.
So maybe fifteen percent of our community earns roughly ninety
percent of our income, leaving about ten percent of our
income for the other eighty five percent. The Big Beautiful
bill disproportionally benefits the wealthy. A lot of these cuts
(20:23):
that are going to occur, a lot of cuts in
social services programs and other programs are going to disproportionately
harm those of lower income. And when you have the
greatest income inequality, the greatest income disparity of any county
in America, then I'm concerned about my constituents, my friends,
my colleagues, my neighbors.
Speaker 6 (20:44):
Philip plus On's Rodeo employees, locals, and the lack of
affordable housing means he has to run a leaner business.
Speaker 5 (20:50):
We'd like to have eighty employees here. We're not up
to where we need to be, but we may do.
There's not enough people here in the valley that live
here to work here because most of them live outside here.
So when you come to the rodeo we're at evening,
you know, they're either one hundred miles away or sixty
miles away down in Star Valley.
Speaker 6 (21:12):
Despite the challenges facing Jackson Hole, it's workers and its
residents say the sense of community remains strong here and
that's what Philip Wilson hopes to preserve, bringing the ultra
wealthy along for the ride.
Speaker 5 (21:25):
If you're going to come to the rodeo, we want
you to have a good time, because we're going to
have a good time. So when you come here, we
try to show them the friendly type of atmosphere. That's
why we do so much handshaking here at this rodeo.
Speaker 6 (21:37):
And there's a cowboy western culture in.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
What there is there is here. You know, the cowboy
culture is I'll tell you one thing that a cowboy
does is every time he sees you, he shakes your hand.
If he sees you tomorrow, he shakes your hand. If
he sees you tomorrow afternoon, he shakes your hand.
Speaker 8 (21:55):
I mean, it is the most amazing community ever. I
can tell you. I have incredibly close friends that are
fishing guides and that are self made billionaires. And frankly,
some of those people I didn't even know they were
really wealthy, because everyone drives the same like f one
point fifty and wears the same kind of jeans around town.
It is a place where there is an enormous amount
(22:16):
of wealth, but showing that wealth is not part of
normal behavior.
Speaker 6 (22:20):
Jonathan Scheckter says he helps the community spirit and respect
for the land will be constant even in the face
of economic change, but he also says they need to
be protected and are no longer as certain as they
once were.
Speaker 7 (22:34):
You just needed to have that hot luck kind of
church social mentality because there were too few of us
and we had to rely on each other in a
very harsh and extreme place. And so we can't take
a lot of these things for granted. We can't take
for granted transmitting our cultural values from one generation to another,
we can't take for granted transmitting a healthy ecosystem from
(22:56):
one generation to another. If we lose that, then we've
lost something really special, right.
Speaker 6 (23:00):
Not really well, we got to get start a good camp.
These worries seem far away. On a Friday night at
the Rodeo, a view from the stands shows that although
much has changed here, much abides. The story of Jackson
Hole is one of American ideals. The wealthy and the
ultra wealthy of today may see what the Wilsons saw
when they arrived in Teton County over one hundred years ago,
(23:23):
an American frontier that can share the bounty of the
land with its people. But more than ever before, those
who live here will have to reconcile the values of
capitalism with the culture born of cowboys and unforgiving landscapes,
a culture which may be their greatest asset of all.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Coming up fresh off his transformative acquisition of Hess, we
talk with Chevron CEO Mike Worth about what it means
for his company and what it tells us about his industry. Overall,
this is a story about growth and renewal. Not long ago,
all the talk was about the looming end of fossil fuels,
(24:06):
But now it looks like much of that talk was premature.
One of those who was steering his global energy company
through the ups and the downs is Mike Worth, chairman
and CEO of Chevron, who says that what the industry
needed all along was balance.
Speaker 10 (24:22):
Whenever you talk about energy, there are really three things
that matter, and this is whether you're a company or
a country. Affordability, because energy that people can't afford usn't
change lives. Reliability, reliability and build an economy to be built,
and then protecting the environment. And in policy discussions or
(24:43):
in business strategy. And if we focus only on one
of those, we suboptimize on the other two. Well, I
think there was a genuine hope to transition to a
carbon free economy very rapidly, and I think what that
led people to miss was the reasons why the energy
system we have today is in place.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Whenever you have balanced, there are some trade offs. How
do you minimize the damage to the climate while pursuing
the other goals.
Speaker 10 (25:11):
The first thing you do is you focus on efficiency.
The best way to find new energy is not to
use energy wastefully than we have today, and so efficiency
in industrial facilities, in transportation, in manufacturing, all really really essential.
The second thing that we're focused on is investing in
(25:31):
technology so that we think hold the promise to reduce
the carbon intensity of energy use in the future. So
hydrogen is one example, renewable fuels is a second, geothermal
is a third. Earlier this year we started up our
largest renewable diesel facility. We're the second largest producer renewable
fuels in the United States. Later this year we will
(25:52):
start up the largest green hydrogen facility in the United States,
using solar power to turn water into hydrogen, and that
will have the storage capacity equivalent to three times all
the grid installed batteries in the entire United States.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
As we talk right now, it looks like the demand
for fossil fuels will continue as far as the eye
can see. Do you think it peaks at some point?
Speaker 10 (26:14):
Demand last year is the highest that it's ever been.
Demand this year is up versus last year. Demand next
year will be up again again, not because of anything
our industry is doing, but the population on the planet
continues to grow. There will come a time when the
population on the planet plateaus, when development will have largely
occurred for most of the less developed part of the world.
(26:37):
And efficiency will have offset some of that growth. Different
models give you different assumptions on when that will occur,
but the important thing is once we reach that point,
it's not like demand for oil will then drop off
a cliff. The big consumers of oil are airplanes, ships,
long haul trucking, and so even as we find these
(26:58):
new technologies more competitive, we're going to have existing consumers
of energy that will last for a long time to come.
This is going to be measured in decades.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
The global demand for oil something over one hundred million
barrels a day. How long do you think that can sustain.
Speaker 10 (27:14):
Well, we're closer to one hundred and five million barrels
a day today. We'll probably be close to one hundred
and ten million barrels a day by the end of
this decade, and then some forecasts would have it beginning
to plateau, some would have it continuing to grow. OPEK
has a growth out through twenty fifty. The IEA shows
a plateau beginning in twenty thirty. Our view is probably
(27:35):
somewhere in between those two, but that's still an enormous
amount of demand in the world to be met.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Chevron specifically has positioned itself recently to be in a
position to supply some of that with your Hess acquisition.
Explain why that's strategically was so important to Chevron and
to you.
Speaker 10 (27:51):
Well, we've got a strong growth profile through the rest
of this decade. The Permian Basin just hit a million
barrels a day, We've had global records the last couple
of quarters for production. Has brings with it a nice
growth profile that extends beyond the next few years as
we reach maturity on some of our big projects that
have been starting up. Has had some very talented people
(28:14):
in exploration who've been quite involved in the identification and
appraisal of the resource in Guyana, which is the largest
new discovery in the world over the last couple of decades.
So we're going to bring their talent, their experience, their
insights and blend it with ours. And as we move forward,
we've got acreage around the world and we're going to
(28:35):
have some a stronger team as we move forward to
challenge some of our conventional thinking, maybe help us think
about these opportunities differently, and I'm confident we'll get better results.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Can you get along with Exxon as a venture partner
down a Guyana.
Speaker 10 (28:51):
We partner to share risk, to share costs. It's quite common,
particularly on large scale developments. We put our people together,
get the best out of the people from organizations that
bring different experiences together, and we got great respect for
all the companies that we work with. I would fully
expect that our team will be good partners with Excellon
(29:13):
and vice versa in Guyana. Many of the people that
we'll be working on this project are the he s
people who have now joined Chevron.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Chevron is much more than an oil Company's a gas
company too, let's talk about natural gas. There was a
time that was such a sort of a bridge energy
getting to solar and renewables. Is that still true?
Speaker 10 (29:31):
I actually think it's becoming more true once again, or
more recognized. As you bring wind and solar into an
electricity grid. They have great strengths once the capital has
been invested. The marginal cost is very low. But they're
not good at providing baseload capacity because they're variable with
the wind and the sunshine. You can't really turn the
(29:53):
sun up brighter or make the wind blow. It is
what it is, and so you need other sources of
supply to provide loading for the grid. Natural gas is
ideal for that. It's much lower emitting than coal.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Give us a sense of how you think Chevron can
help really contribute the power that we need for those
huge data centers.
Speaker 10 (30:12):
The demand is coming, in fact, it's already here, and
we're talking to the biggest companies in the world that
are investing in building these models. The two constraints that
they have right now are chips the gp use that
go into the data centers, and electricity. The US is
in a race with China for leadership in AI, and
(30:36):
both countries have strong technology bases and strong energy resources.
The challenge for us in the US is to mobilize
our energy to support the growth in power demand. We've
got a grid that is challenged in terms of putting
all that power through the grid. So what we're looking
at doing is building a large scale power generation off
(30:57):
the grid where we can go fast, we can deliver
large scale, we can take advantage of the abundant, low
cost gas resource in this country. So we're in deep
discussions with several of the biggest companies working on this.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
We have announced already a deal with Vernova and with
Engine Number one. Where is that project? When will it
first be online somewhere.
Speaker 10 (31:16):
So this is what I'm referring to. We've got a
site identified a primary site. We've got some other sites
that we're working on as well. We've got seven of
g Vernova's largest turbans coming with delivery beginning next year,
so it's to be over four gigawatts of power generation.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
When you talk about permitting, I do think about governments
federal certainly with the administrations to say, but also state.
When you talk about balance, how do you strike a
balance between noy pick names. Gavin Newsom on the one
hand in California and Donald Trump in Washington. They don't
seem to see eye to eye and energy policy.
Speaker 10 (31:49):
They probably don't see eye to eye on a number
of things, energy policy being one of them. And certainly
we've got long history in California, a large footprint in California.
But the policies are the state have been designed to
discourage investment in the traditional energy system and encourage investment
into renewables and the next generation. We talked earlier about balance.
(32:11):
My belief is California does not have the balance right.
California is trying to convert the supply side too fast
and the demand side hasn't adjusted yet, and that runs
the risk of creating shortages. I think President Trump is
more of a believer in all of the above, certainly
been an advocate for oil and gas, and I think
his policy approach is more market oriented and likely to
(32:35):
yield the kinds of results that we're talking about in
terms of competitiveness.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Give us sense how you became CEO. What brought you
Chevron to beginning with?
Speaker 10 (32:45):
I had a degree in chemical engineering, and I got
a summer job where I worked in engineering and really
enjoyed it in the early nineteen eighties. In my early twenties,
I decided to go to California. I land with Standard
Oil of California, which is what our company was own
ass at the time, and I found myself working with
incredibly talented people on important projects around the world that
(33:07):
blended engineering and technology with economics and business, and then
with this geopolitical overlay that we're talking about, and forty
three years later, I'm still doing it.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Looking back in your career, was there a formative moment
that you look back on and draw from as you
deal with crises or difficult situations.
Speaker 10 (33:26):
I'll tell you the most recent one that I learned
a lot from is COVID, and I had some insights
that this thing was perhaps going to be worse than
most people thought, and I was able to use that
to begin to mobilize a response to our company before
the rest of the world really recognized what was going on.
(33:46):
One of the first things that I did is I
called my three immediate predecessors, each of whom served as
CEO for about a decade, and all of whom lived
within a stone's throw of where I lived. And they
had gone through wars, they had gone through terrorist attacks,
financial crises, and they all had experience dealing with an
unexpected black Swan type of event. And they were incredibly
(34:06):
generous with their reflections on what they would have done differently,
their suggestions to me on what I should do in
response to it. And it was nice to not have
to figure it out all myself.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
You've been CEO for a while. What is there left
for you to accomplish?
Speaker 10 (34:23):
Well, we've got immediate integration of an acquisition. We're going
through a large corporate restructuring, which is rewiring business processes
and where work gets done. We've got a contract to
operate in Kazakhstan that runs out in the next few years.
Those would be some things that are on my list
that still need to be taken care of.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Coming up, the Lone Star State is giving New York
to Wall Street a run for its money. We look
at what Dallas is doing to become its own version
of Lower Manhattan. This is a story about ambition. They
say every thing is bigger in Texas, but for the
Lone Star State, the status quo is not big enough,
(35:05):
particularly when it comes to the financial sector. Our colleague
Scarlett Foo went to Dallas to see what it is
doing to attract Wall Street business and whether it can
handle the growth.
Speaker 11 (35:19):
When we first moved to Dallas, we lived across the
street from the kids elementary school, and I'll never forget
like walking through the park with like the ducks, and
it was like a fairy tale.
Speaker 12 (35:28):
In Dallas, I think there's no limit.
Speaker 13 (35:32):
Dallas is a great place to be.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Dallas has long been the financial hub of Texas. Since
the pandemic, it's become a leading financial and innovation center
in the nation. According to the Census Bureau, Dallas Fort
Worth Arlington was the third largest gaining metro area in
the US from July twenty twenty three to July twenty
twenty four, adding almost one hundred and seventy thousand residents.
Speaker 14 (35:52):
I moved for work. I had a great opportunity to
join innovative company that was wanting to grow from local
to global. I was fifteen years an entrepreneur in Los
Angeles and truly thirty thousand miles a year in a
car trying to get home with the kids all that
good stuff, and I just thought there had to be
a better way. And we just started looking. And a
friend called me from here in Dallas. He says, you've
(36:14):
got to come out and take a look and see
all the things.
Speaker 10 (36:16):
That are going on here.
Speaker 14 (36:18):
And I did, and here we are eleven years later.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Sarah and Ryan Brown ditched California palm trees for Texas
tumbleweeds ten years ago, settling down in the Dallas suburb
of Highland Park.
Speaker 14 (36:29):
I see an influx of tech and tech focused entrepreneurs
and operators more and more every day. It's a hot
topic here, and I think a lot of it is
also coming because the investments that are coming here is
a tech entrepreneur or someone in tech. You don't have
to live out of your car in Silicon Valley.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
This relative affordability makes a northern Texas region a magnet
for both young people at the start of their careers
as well as established professionals. Dallas now has the second
most finance jobs in the ahead of both Chicago and
la and while it might remain some way off New York,
Mayor Eric Johnson sees his city as more than just
an upstart.
Speaker 15 (37:09):
The future is Dallas because I think this is where
the growth in the country is occurring. In terms of business,
the Sun Belt is the fastest growing part of the
United States. Texas is the fastest growing part of the
Sun Belt. Dallas is the fastest growing part of Texas.
You know, if you want to be successful, you go
where the action is headed, not where it is. I
(37:29):
think the action in this country is headed to this
part of the United States, and you can't be in
a better place than Dallas.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Financial firms are leading the action in Dallas, from Wells
Fargo topping out construction of a five hundred million dollar
campus in the inner city suburb of Irving, to Goldman
Sacks building its second biggest US headquarters downtown, to the
New York Stock Exchange moving its Chicago branch to Dallas,
culminating in what some are calling y'all street.
Speaker 14 (37:55):
Folks have been trying to figure out what to call it. Right,
you have the Texas Stock Exchange Texas, and then all
of a sudden, y'all Street came in. I think it's
going to stick.
Speaker 6 (38:05):
I think it's great.
Speaker 12 (38:06):
I still would tell my bankers, follow the money. That's
exactly what everybody's doing. The money's here.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Elena Agatha is chairman of the Dallas Region for JP
Morgan Chase. After starting her banking career in New York,
followed by stints in London and San Francisco, she returned
home to Texas in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 12 (38:25):
As I grew with the firm, the state grew. I've
literally watched it happen, and with today thirty two thousand employees,
we have more employees in the state of Texas than
any other region for JP Morgan, including New York. Including
New York.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Agatha has seen the city of Dallas grow and stature
in the financial world. In the nineteen eighties, Michael Lewis
coined the term equities in Dallas and made that into
a shorthand for the least desirable assignment and investment bank,
the equivalent of being out of sight.
Speaker 12 (38:55):
Out of mind. Yeah anymore?
Speaker 1 (38:58):
Yeah, does anyone reference that? No, No one says that.
Speaker 12 (39:00):
No one says that anymore. But I remember that. But
no one says that anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 12 (39:05):
I think because of the growth. I think the wealth,
the wealth that has been generated here today. We are
so diverse as an economy. I mean, we got smart
it's everything from tech, food, retail, huge retail. But that diversity,
it really attracted the growth that people didn't have to
(39:27):
just be an Ola Gasca to move down here years ago.
You really needed to be in New York for a
big job. That has all changed. We have lots of
jobs here in Dallas that are national jobs.
Speaker 13 (39:39):
Dallas has a lot of things going for it as
a city. Number one, there's the infrastructure here too. It's
a very business friendly environment. And three, there's that tremendous
depth of a talent pool. Young professionals are coming here
in droves. Just anecdotally. We recently had a post for
a new analyst position and had over two hundred applicants
within twenty four hours from outside of the state. Of Texas.
(40:01):
Really now, this is a career move. It is the
career move for young people to come to Dallas to
build something.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
JP Morgan isn't the only big bank betting on Dallas.
I believe you can almost see Goldman Sachs's new headquarters
from your office here.
Speaker 12 (40:14):
Oh right there, Yes, I look at it every day.
It's very annoying. No I'm chasing. But and then in
Bavay and you just see this this along this park.
The growth that has happened, and it's attracted many financial
type institutions.
Speaker 13 (40:31):
The opportunity set here in Dallas, especially in the wealth
management side, is tremendous. The number of households in our
target demographic has grown twenty percent year over year in
the last one year alone, and it's been consistent over
the last five. So I just can't imagine a better
place to do what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Ashley Herps is the head of the Dallas market at
JP Morgan Private Bank. He is one of the city's
many recent transplants.
Speaker 13 (40:52):
We moved here for my job. The opportunity to run
JP Morgan's private bank in Dallas was an absolute dream
come true. Was a dream job, no break for our family.
It was definitely not easy. The career decision was easy,
the personal decision was harder. It's just been an incredible
place to build a career for me. Like I love
(41:12):
my job. I can't wait to get to work every day.
But my family's happy and that's really important to me
and I. I think it's a good testament to what
living in Dallas is Like.
Speaker 15 (41:21):
Dallas absolutely can handle the population growth we're experiencing.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson is quick to compare his city
with New York.
Speaker 15 (41:28):
This has been a long term, conscious effort on the
part of the city and our business community to make
sure Dallas continues to be a truly pro business city.
It's not just rhetoric. We are a sanctuary city from
socialism in this country. This is a place where we
(41:48):
still actually view business and people who create jobs and
people who contribute to the economic growth city. That's a
good thing. They're not the enemy. We're not trying to
punish them. We don't vilify them. It's just not in
our DNA like. Dallas is a city that gave the
world Texas instruments, gave the world Southwest Airlines. A lot
(42:09):
of are great fortune five cutter companies started here. We
have a culture here that really respects business.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So when it comes to financial firms, what do you
think is Dallas's biggest straw to that sector.
Speaker 15 (42:20):
We don't really feel the need to throw incentives around
to get people to invest in Dallas and to move
to Dallas and to relocate significant operations to Dallas. We
will target a big fish like a Goldman Sacks, because
then the other companies will follow. You'll create an incentive
for other financial service firms to be in that same
ecosystem with the company like a Goldman Saxe, But you
(42:43):
also will get the accounting firms, the law firms, and
it becomes sort of this virtuous cycle. So the Goldman
Sacks deals a great example of a case where they're
going to invest over half a billion dollars in an
eight hundred thousand square foot development that's going to create
five thousand jobs and it's just going to be transformative
for our city.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Chris Kleiner. It leads Hunt Realty, which is one of
the developers behind the Goldenen Project. Hunt Realty is also
working on a massive development to the north of Dallas
with other market names. The Professional Golfers Association of America
and Universal.
Speaker 16 (43:15):
Fields is our twenty five hundred acre development in Frisco.
It's a gem amidst all the unique, positive things going
on in Frisco and Prosper and other parts North and
there was the opportunity to master plan something really special.
We set our sites to create something different, something world class.
(43:35):
The inclusion of twenty six miles of trails, the inclusion
of water, the inclusion of parks, different price point homes,
very unique, mixed use, retail, residential office development. Mass attracts mass,
and we're over a thousand homes being built. We've got
great residential home developer partners. Universal has bought one hundred acres.
(43:58):
They're going to be opening a very nique ages three
to eleven theme park here in twenty six. University of
North Texas has a Frisco campus that is adjacent to
our site. We're thrilled with the potential and we're seeing
that come to life.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Just northeast of Fields lies Prosper, another small town in
the Dallas Fort Worth area that is pitching families on
its affordability and quality of life.
Speaker 17 (44:20):
We're saying, here's this community that we have awesome amenities,
great school district. You've got space to meet people. We
have lifestyle programs. It doesn't matter where you come from.
We get a lot of people in from the West Coast,
Toyota relocation. There's been other Fortune five hundred relocation.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
David blom is president of Telesgroup. It's Winsong Range project
in Prosper is now home to some of Prosper's forty
thousand plus residents. From two thousand to twenty twenty five,
Prosper's population has grown by two thousand percent.
Speaker 17 (44:52):
It's become more diverse. And diverse as probably an overused term,
but with corporate reloca from the West Coast, we've had
people come in from the Midwest, from the northeast.
Speaker 1 (45:05):
The risk is all this growth makes Dallas and it's
surrounding suburbs less affordable.
Speaker 11 (45:10):
There was any issue that our community is facing is
that the housing prices are going up so less families
are able to afford it. So we have more seats
in our school, So that could be two ways, right,
We don't have enough funding for our school, but we
don't have crowded schools either, so I guess it's a balance.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
New residents also point out a downside of master planned
communities the limited outdoor public spaces, especially when compared with
the natural landscapes and wonders along the coasts.
Speaker 14 (45:36):
I think it's really difficult to be a weekend warrior
here on the recreation side. And when we lived in California,
we're at the ocean, we're at the beach, we're in
the mountains, we're doing everything outside. There's not a National
forest here, there's no Bureau Land Management here, and so
everything is very privatized. So I do miss the ability
to just get outside and maybe get lost.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
The growth of Dallas can't be questioned, but y'all Street
is not yet a replacement for Wall Street. While firms
are adding middle and back office jobs there, the seats
of power still reside in New York. Jamie Diamond and
the CEOs of JP Morgan's different businesses aren't likely to
move from the firm's brand new headquarters in Midtown Manhattan.
But Dallas is heading in the right direction.
Speaker 12 (46:18):
The growth just keeps happening. Our Plano office was about
six thousand when we built it, and we kept adding
to it. You need an area of the country that
can get to both coasts quickly, and this center of
the country is a huge advantage. Jamie used to tease
about the headquarters. We'll be here. No, No, it's in
New York, make no mistake. But he is very proud
(46:40):
of Texas.
Speaker 15 (46:41):
I want people to know that Dallas really is a
place where the American dream is still very much alive
and well. And it's not rhetoric, like, we really are
a place where people can come. We're not from here,
we walk come outsiders. It's a place that really embraces
energy and hard work that can do spear we have
when we see in other folks, we embrace it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
How long will it take for Dallas to win as
a financial center.
Speaker 12 (47:06):
I think we're winning. I really think we're winning now.
With the growth. There are still people that have not
been to Texas that might have kind of an image
in their head. So I think that over the next
ten years is more people understand the sophistication. I think
that that image of Texas will continue to change.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
That does it for us Here at Wall Street Week,
I'm David Weston. See you next week for more stories
of capitalism.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
This is Wall Street Week. I'm David Weston bringing you
stories of capitalism. When FED officials made their way to
Jackson Hole this week, they were helping support the richest
county in the country. We look at how it got
that way and what it tells us about the rest
of the US economy. Plus, it turns out that news
of the death of fossil fuels was greatly exaggerated. We
(00:42):
talk with Chevron chairman and CEO Mike Worth about the
future of his industry and how his big acquisition of
Hess sets his company up for what comes next. And
Wall Street, or at least part of it, may be
moving south. No, not to Miami, but to Dallas. What
is the city doing to the financial sector and how
far does it have to go to catch New York.
(01:04):
But we start with those FED meetings in Jackson Hall
and Chair Powell's remarks for a review, We turned a
former governor of the Reserve Bank of India, Raghuram Rajen
now at Chicago's Booth School.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Well, this was a very finely balanced speech.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
I think he had to emphasize that the FED is
still looking for more data At the same time, he
had to acknowledge the fact that, you know, there's a
lot of pressure on the FED to essentially acquiesce to
the government and cut raids. So he had to nod
(01:42):
to both sides, saying, the FED will do what it
has to do, but it's not ignoring the government.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
And there that's why I.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Think it was actually quite masterful the way he managed
to sway expectations but slightly more towards a cut, but
with a subtle change in words. What he said was,
and I'm going to read this, the shifting balance of
risks may warrant adjusting our policy stunts.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Note the word me.
Speaker 4 (02:16):
That means he's not committing to it, but he's saying
we're bending a little more towards cutting in September.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
So that balance of risk shifting, I think towards the
possibility of cut. I think specifically with respect to labor.
And he did talk about the balance of risk on
labor tilting to the downside, even as inflation risks is
the upside. What's your take on the shape of the
US labor market today.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
Well, it does look like it's softening now, you know,
you don't see layoffs in a big way. Yet, what
you do see is the base of hiring has been
relatively slow, and partly because of the fact that immigration
has come down a lot, the labor force is not
(03:03):
growing so much. So even with the low pace of hiring,
you're not seeing unemployment go up. What that means, I
think from his perspective is that labor market is weak
enough that he doesn't see a substantial increase because of
second round effects of inflation. Now, this is central banks
(03:26):
speak for saying, look, TIFFs are going to push inflation up,
but what we really worry about is the worker asking
for higher wages, which creates more inflation down the line.
He discounted that in his speech, saying he doesn't see
that that will push inflation up because labor market, the
(03:49):
labor market is relatively weak at this point.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
At the same time, we do have core inflation that's
well above that two percent target that he reiterated once again,
what was the last time that the Federal Reserve cut
rates with the core inflation at that level.
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Well, it's not just that it has that it is
at that level, it is that it hasn't budged downwards
for quite some time. In fact, the last readings looked
like they're going upwards. That was the point where I
concluded that he was being quite dubvish, because there's no
mention of the fact that we haven't seen a downward
(04:30):
adjustment in inflation. Typically central banks cut when they see
inflation coming down. That puts a lot of weight on
weakness in the labor market, bringing inflation down further into
the Fed's comfort zone. There is no evidence for that
at this point. It is a hope.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
We have ambiguous or even conflicting data on inflation on
the one hand, labor on the other. And that's against
the backdrop of a fair amount of uncertainty, particularly uncertainty
because the Trump administration is really quite explicitly trying to
change the narrative, particularly with tariffs. What about the risk
of tariffs. How much of have we seen? How much
of a risk is suppose?
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Well, we haven't seen a lot.
Speaker 4 (05:15):
Though one should note and chair out noted that goods
inflation which was coming down, actually it was not inflation.
Goods prices were coming down, so inflation was negative. That
has shifted around to a positive rate of inflation on goods.
We still haven't seen a full pass through of the
(05:38):
tariffs into prices that is coming, and the chair said, look,
we think it is going to be a one off.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
What we worry about.
Speaker 4 (05:51):
Is it either feeding into inflationary expectations, that is, people
think inflation is going to be higher, or it leads
into wages through a tight labor market. He discounted the
tight labor market issue, but he said inflationary expectations. We're
going to be watching that and we certainly will do
(06:11):
what it takes to keep inflationary expectations anchored. Broadly, he
seemed to suggest that tariffs were manageable. What he didn't
talk about, as we've said before, is that he didn't
talk about the fact that inflation is way higher than
the FED should be comfortable with.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
As you noted, Professor, he was very careful in saying
that the shifting risks may won't not necessarily, but may
warrant an adjustment. At the same time, the markets certainly
took it as almost a guarantee in September, there's going
to be a cut given where all the data are.
And what he had to say, what do you think
the FED should be doing.
Speaker 3 (06:50):
Well?
Speaker 4 (06:51):
I think he's bought the FED some room. What will
be critical. Are the August labor market numbers. They look
as weak as the July numbers looked. The Fed will
have a cost iron case for cutting. If, however, you
see again a shift back towards higher employment numbers, I
(07:15):
think the FED will really be conflicted at that point.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
The part of Chairpal's speech that got the most attention,
certainly for the market, was the part about what's likely
to happen in September where we are on cutting. But
there was another half of the speech which had to
do with the so called framework, which the FED tends
to revisit every five years or so, and of course
last time was August of twenty twenty. It was a
very different world. As he noted in his speech. What
(07:43):
did you take about what he had to say about
how they're changing that framework, Well.
Speaker 4 (07:48):
It was very interesting. He essentially said, we were tackling
a problem which no longer is that important, which was
the fact that the Fed had been tackling low inflation
for a long time. Inflation was lower than where the
FED wanted it to be, and the Fed essentially was
(08:09):
at what they call the effective lower bound. It couldn't
cut interest rates anymore, and in that kind of environment. Really,
the objective of the framework that the FED brought in
then was to push inflation up. And just a few
months after they brought that new framework in in twenty twenty,
(08:30):
the problem was exactly the opposite, which is high inflation,
and the FED now had to bring inflation down.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
And essentially what Chair Paul.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Said was, look, you know, we had the right framework
for the wrong problem, and at this point what we're
trying to do is move back to our old framework.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And finally, Professor, this was his last speech by all
appearances at Jackson Hole. As he noted his eighth straight speech,
I will reflect on his legacy and particularly I really
remember it wasn't that long ago we were talking about
hard landing, soft landing, a lot of people saying we're
gonna have to have a recession. In retrospect, it looks
like the soft landing happened under his watch.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
Well, yes, and I think unfortunately he will not get
as much credit as he should for navigating the FED
through very difficult times towards what seemed like a soft
landing at the beginning of this year. Of course, the
volatility from the new administration's policies has put that into
(09:44):
some question. But from the Fed's perspective, after the sort
of mistake that was made in the early days of
the pandemic in thinking the inflation then would be transitory,
the FED did a very credit job in getting things
back into line. So one he should get more credit
(10:06):
for that. The second I think is that he's displayed
immense calm and equanimity at a time when the FED
has been pummeled by outside forces. I think that's that's
also very creditable that he has led the FED from
(10:28):
the front, but also shown that, you know, despite all
the pressures from outside, he can focus and and offer
a reasonable view of what a central bank should do.
That may also, in the years to come be seen
as a very important legacy. He's led with honor, and
(10:52):
he's been very very careful, but also uh, you know,
reflected great in digrity while leading the FED.
Speaker 5 (11:04):
Up.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Next, we take a closer look at the wealthiest county
and the wealthiest country in the world and how it
got there. This is a story about America the beautiful,
and how the beauty of one particular part of America
is way more than just skin deep. Once a year,
(11:25):
Jackson how Wyoming is a monetary policy mecca, but the
resort town in Teetan County is a symbol of the
way wealth transforms some parts of a town and how
other parts may never change. Michael McKee tells us why.
Speaker 6 (11:41):
The wealthiest place in America today is a long way
from New York or San Francisco. It's much more famous
for its mountains, it's bison, and it's cowboys, than it
is for its billionaires. The residents would prefer to keep
it that way, but they would also tell you that
things are changing here fast.
Speaker 7 (12:03):
Me personally, my home has doubled in value in the
last three years, so my balance sheet is looking good,
but my income certainly hasn't doubled in the last three years.
Speaker 6 (12:13):
Jonathan Scheckter runs a think tank and sits on the
town council in Jackson, Wyoming, not far from the hotel
that hosts FED Chair J Powell and Central bankers from
around the world every summer.
Speaker 7 (12:24):
If you go back and look at Jackson Hall, historically
we are a high, isolated mountain valley in the northwest
corner of Wyoming. It's been very hard to get here
and very hard to get out, or once you're here.
Speaker 6 (12:37):
The result an economic transformation over two centuries, from trapping
to ranching to tourism, as the community's isolation and rugged
landscape eventually became a selling point for visitors. All right,
that's what I like to hear.
Speaker 7 (12:52):
People would come to visit the national park. All of
Grand Teton National Park in the southern half of Yellowstone
are within our county. And then in the early nineteen
six the Jackson Hall Ski Area got started, and that
got started actually with a federal government loan that was
intended for the most impoverished areas in America because we
didn't have anything but a summer economy. The geographic isolation
(13:15):
still really affects who we are, our ecosystem, our community,
our sense of who we are, but it has much
less effect on our economy. So now we have people
from around the world who come and live here part
time full time. They work from anywhere, so we've really
become a hub of remote work.
Speaker 6 (13:34):
For decades, it was New York County, which is primarily
the island of Manhattan, that led the country in wealth accumulation,
but in the early two thousands, Teeton County jumped into
the lead. That trend has rapidly accelerated in recent years,
and New York has tumbled into fourth place since the pandemic. Today,
the average per capita income in Teeton County is about
(13:56):
a half million dollars a year.
Speaker 7 (13:58):
Where the wealthiest county, the wealthiest country in the history
of the world. We also sit at the heart of
the greatest intact ecosystem in the lower forty eight And
if you think about things through the eyes of sustainability,
where you have ecological capital, financial capital, and human capital,
I don't think there's any place in the world that
(14:18):
could compare to here.
Speaker 6 (14:20):
Jonathan and others say it is no coincidence that a
singular ecosystem and a singular economy go hand in hand.
About ninety seven percent of the land in Teton County
is publicly owned, dedicated to parks and forests, and among
those who can afford to live anywhere on the planet,
there seems to be a belief that something is special
(14:40):
about this territory. But then again, there are plenty of
other spectacular places in America, so natural beauty is just
one piece of the puzzle here. Another is the tax system.
Speaker 7 (14:53):
Phrases we are an onshore, offshore tax haven, and so
we are hands down the most wealth friendly and income
friendly and wealth preservation friendly state in the Union. No
other state comes close.
Speaker 6 (15:10):
Low property tax, low sales tax, and zero income tax
in Wyoming are strong incentives. But then again, every other
county in the state benefits from the same friendly tax regime,
and their annual incomes are much closer to the national average.
Titan County leaves the others in the dust. So what's
(15:31):
the secret ingredient? If it's not just the land or
the taxes, maybe it's something else altogether. When in doubt,
ask the locals.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
It was a small town. Everybody knew everybody here in
this town. At one time it was extremely Western.
Speaker 6 (15:48):
Philip Wilson is the great grandson of Sylvester Wilson, who
was the first settler to bring his family to the
valley in the late eighteen hundreds. The town, five miles
west of Jackson, still bears his surname. Today, Philip and
his family run the Jackson Hole Rodeo, and he says
a lot has changed here even within his lifetime.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
When I was younger, basically everybody had cattle ranchers, few
dude ranchers around, but not a lot of them, and
then the hotel started coming in and torror started coming in.
Everybody that comes to Jackson Hole immediately falls in love
with it, wants a piece of it. We want to
have them feel part of Jackson Hole when you're here.
(16:30):
We want them to feel that the atmosphere. That's why
adhere to Rodeo. I even go out in the parking
and welcome people that come in. I turn around and
shake their hand when they leave.
Speaker 6 (16:42):
For Philip Wilson, his family and so many of the
other residents, the cowboy culture is not just for show.
They were born into it. But he also says it's
no wonder that culture appeals to outsiders and newcomers.
Speaker 5 (16:55):
That's what draws people to Jackson Hole. The people that
are here are friendly type people. They're outgoing, near friendly.
That's the only way they know how to be because
that's the way they run their lives.
Speaker 8 (17:08):
It's a very very popular. I think it's made into
a lot of the must visit when you come to
Jackson Hole type of places.
Speaker 6 (17:14):
Among those drawn here by the land and the culture
is Kate Moore. Low taxes aren't a motivation for her.
She still files in New York, where her work is
based as chief Investment Officer for City Private Bank. She's
joined a growing group of people making the move from
Wall Street to the West.
Speaker 8 (17:32):
I bought my house a little over seven years ago,
so pre COVID, which was excellent timing given real estate prices.
But I've been coming out here for thirty years. My
first trip was when I was in high school.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
Actually, now your job is essentially on Park Avenue, but
you're splitting your time here.
Speaker 8 (17:47):
Yeah, I split my time, and I split my time
in my previous role as well. But I think you know,
I'm someone who manages a global team. We're not all
in the same location at all times anyway, and you know,
if I'm working the appropriate hours in this case East
Coast market hours, I'm up at four, which is can
be a little bit tough. I think a lot of
the finance people in town do the same thing.
Speaker 6 (18:07):
More says there's also a deep appreciation for the region's
history here. She herself lives in a renovated cabin that
was built in nineteen twenty nine.
Speaker 3 (18:15):
But whether the.
Speaker 6 (18:16):
Homes are new or old, one look at real estate
prices will give you an idea of just how high
the peaks of wealth in Teton County can go.
Speaker 9 (18:25):
Our supply is limited here, but demand seems to go
up every year.
Speaker 6 (18:31):
Brandon Spackman is a local real estate agent and he
currently has the listing for the most expensive property in
the area. That's where we met up with him for
a tour. It seems like you have almost an unlimited
supply of buyers.
Speaker 8 (18:47):
We do.
Speaker 9 (18:47):
It's a big investment, and a lot of it is
just per timing in their lives and what they want
to do.
Speaker 6 (18:54):
When he says big investment, he means it. The river
House sits on a thirty six acre property in Wilson, Wyoming,
the town founded by Philip Wilson's great grandfather. It's about
ten miles from downtown Jackson and is currently listed at
sixty million dollars. Obviously, you have a room like this,
You walk into the room and it helps sell the house.
(19:16):
You want to live in a place like this. Now,
how many houses are in this price.
Speaker 9 (19:21):
Range over twenty million. A lot of properties are in
the twentieth thirty range.
Speaker 6 (19:27):
Properties like river House form the higher end of the
range in a place where private land is hard to
come by. But as the ultra premium market goes up,
so does the rest of it. Some people here say
that billionaires are pushing out the millionaires, not to mention
those in lower income brackets who sometimes commute from across
the border in Idaho. And Jonathan Scheckter thinks the wealth
(19:49):
divide could become a bigger problem under the latest federal legislation.
You're number one in per capita income, but also number
one in income disparity.
Speaker 7 (20:00):
Yes, we have roughly ninety percent of our income. A
little north of that is earned by the highest earners.
So maybe fifteen percent of our community earns roughly ninety
percent of our income, leaving about ten percent of our
income for the other eighty five percent. The Big Beautiful
bill disproportionally benefits the wealthy. A lot of these cuts
(20:23):
that are going to occur, a lot of cuts in
social services programs and other programs are going to disproportionately
harm those of lower income. And when you have the
greatest income inequality, the greatest income disparity of any county
in America, then I'm concerned about my constituents, my friends,
my colleagues, my neighbors.
Speaker 6 (20:44):
Philip plus On's Rodeo employees, locals, and the lack of
affordable housing means he has to run a leaner business.
Speaker 5 (20:50):
We'd like to have eighty employees here. We're not up
to where we need to be, but we may do.
There's not enough people here in the valley that live
here to work here because most of them live outside here.
So when you come to the rodeo we're at evening,
you know, they're either one hundred miles away or sixty
miles away down in Star Valley.
Speaker 6 (21:12):
Despite the challenges facing Jackson Hole, it's workers and its
residents say the sense of community remains strong here and
that's what Philip Wilson hopes to preserve, bringing the ultra
wealthy along for the ride.
Speaker 5 (21:25):
If you're going to come to the rodeo, we want
you to have a good time, because we're going to
have a good time. So when you come here, we
try to show them the friendly type of atmosphere. That's
why we do so much handshaking here at this rodeo.
Speaker 6 (21:37):
And there's a cowboy western culture in.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
What there is there is here. You know, the cowboy
culture is I'll tell you one thing that a cowboy
does is every time he sees you, he shakes your hand.
If he sees you tomorrow, he shakes your hand. If
he sees you tomorrow afternoon, he shakes your hand.
Speaker 8 (21:55):
I mean, it is the most amazing community ever. I
can tell you. I have incredibly close friends that are
fishing guides and that are self made billionaires. And frankly,
some of those people I didn't even know they were
really wealthy, because everyone drives the same like f one
point fifty and wears the same kind of jeans around town.
It is a place where there is an enormous amount
(22:16):
of wealth, but showing that wealth is not part of
normal behavior.
Speaker 6 (22:20):
Jonathan Scheckter says he helps the community spirit and respect
for the land will be constant even in the face
of economic change, but he also says they need to
be protected and are no longer as certain as they
once were.
Speaker 7 (22:34):
You just needed to have that hot luck kind of
church social mentality because there were too few of us
and we had to rely on each other in a
very harsh and extreme place. And so we can't take
a lot of these things for granted. We can't take
for granted transmitting our cultural values from one generation to another,
we can't take for granted transmitting a healthy ecosystem from
(22:56):
one generation to another. If we lose that, then we've
lost something really special, right.
Speaker 6 (23:00):
Not really well, we got to get start a good camp.
These worries seem far away. On a Friday night at
the Rodeo, a view from the stands shows that although
much has changed here, much abides. The story of Jackson
Hole is one of American ideals. The wealthy and the
ultra wealthy of today may see what the Wilsons saw
when they arrived in Teton County over one hundred years ago,
(23:23):
an American frontier that can share the bounty of the
land with its people. But more than ever before, those
who live here will have to reconcile the values of
capitalism with the culture born of cowboys and unforgiving landscapes,
a culture which may be their greatest asset of all.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Coming up fresh off his transformative acquisition of Hess, we
talk with Chevron CEO Mike Worth about what it means
for his company and what it tells us about his industry. Overall,
this is a story about growth and renewal. Not long ago,
all the talk was about the looming end of fossil fuels,
(24:06):
But now it looks like much of that talk was premature.
One of those who was steering his global energy company
through the ups and the downs is Mike Worth, chairman
and CEO of Chevron, who says that what the industry
needed all along was balance.
Speaker 10 (24:22):
Whenever you talk about energy, there are really three things
that matter, and this is whether you're a company or
a country. Affordability, because energy that people can't afford usn't
change lives. Reliability, reliability and build an economy to be built,
and then protecting the environment. And in policy discussions or
(24:43):
in business strategy. And if we focus only on one
of those, we suboptimize on the other two. Well, I
think there was a genuine hope to transition to a
carbon free economy very rapidly, and I think what that
led people to miss was the reasons why the energy
system we have today is in place.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Whenever you have balanced, there are some trade offs. How
do you minimize the damage to the climate while pursuing
the other goals.
Speaker 10 (25:11):
The first thing you do is you focus on efficiency.
The best way to find new energy is not to
use energy wastefully than we have today, and so efficiency
in industrial facilities, in transportation, in manufacturing, all really really essential.
The second thing that we're focused on is investing in
(25:31):
technology so that we think hold the promise to reduce
the carbon intensity of energy use in the future. So
hydrogen is one example, renewable fuels is a second, geothermal
is a third. Earlier this year we started up our
largest renewable diesel facility. We're the second largest producer renewable
fuels in the United States. Later this year we will
(25:52):
start up the largest green hydrogen facility in the United States,
using solar power to turn water into hydrogen, and that
will have the storage capacity equivalent to three times all
the grid installed batteries in the entire United States.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
As we talk right now, it looks like the demand
for fossil fuels will continue as far as the eye
can see. Do you think it peaks at some point?
Speaker 10 (26:14):
Demand last year is the highest that it's ever been.
Demand this year is up versus last year. Demand next
year will be up again again, not because of anything
our industry is doing, but the population on the planet
continues to grow. There will come a time when the
population on the planet plateaus, when development will have largely
occurred for most of the less developed part of the world.
(26:37):
And efficiency will have offset some of that growth. Different
models give you different assumptions on when that will occur,
but the important thing is once we reach that point,
it's not like demand for oil will then drop off
a cliff. The big consumers of oil are airplanes, ships,
long haul trucking, and so even as we find these
(26:58):
new technologies more competitive, we're going to have existing consumers
of energy that will last for a long time to come.
This is going to be measured in decades.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
The global demand for oil something over one hundred million
barrels a day. How long do you think that can sustain.
Speaker 10 (27:14):
Well, we're closer to one hundred and five million barrels
a day today. We'll probably be close to one hundred
and ten million barrels a day by the end of
this decade, and then some forecasts would have it beginning
to plateau, some would have it continuing to grow. OPEK
has a growth out through twenty fifty. The IEA shows
a plateau beginning in twenty thirty. Our view is probably
(27:35):
somewhere in between those two, but that's still an enormous
amount of demand in the world to be met.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Chevron specifically has positioned itself recently to be in a
position to supply some of that with your Hess acquisition.
Explain why that's strategically was so important to Chevron and
to you.
Speaker 10 (27:51):
Well, we've got a strong growth profile through the rest
of this decade. The Permian Basin just hit a million
barrels a day, We've had global records the last couple
of quarters for production. Has brings with it a nice
growth profile that extends beyond the next few years as
we reach maturity on some of our big projects that
have been starting up. Has had some very talented people
(28:14):
in exploration who've been quite involved in the identification and
appraisal of the resource in Guyana, which is the largest
new discovery in the world over the last couple of decades.
So we're going to bring their talent, their experience, their
insights and blend it with ours. And as we move forward,
we've got acreage around the world and we're going to
(28:35):
have some a stronger team as we move forward to
challenge some of our conventional thinking, maybe help us think
about these opportunities differently, and I'm confident we'll get better results.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
Can you get along with Exxon as a venture partner
down a Guyana.
Speaker 10 (28:51):
We partner to share risk, to share costs. It's quite common,
particularly on large scale developments. We put our people together,
get the best out of the people from organizations that
bring different experiences together, and we got great respect for
all the companies that we work with. I would fully
expect that our team will be good partners with Excellon
(29:13):
and vice versa in Guyana. Many of the people that
we'll be working on this project are the he s
people who have now joined Chevron.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Chevron is much more than an oil Company's a gas
company too, let's talk about natural gas. There was a
time that was such a sort of a bridge energy
getting to solar and renewables. Is that still true?
Speaker 10 (29:31):
I actually think it's becoming more true once again, or
more recognized. As you bring wind and solar into an
electricity grid. They have great strengths once the capital has
been invested. The marginal cost is very low. But they're
not good at providing baseload capacity because they're variable with
the wind and the sunshine. You can't really turn the
(29:53):
sun up brighter or make the wind blow. It is
what it is, and so you need other sources of
supply to provide loading for the grid. Natural gas is
ideal for that. It's much lower emitting than coal.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Give us a sense of how you think Chevron can
help really contribute the power that we need for those
huge data centers.
Speaker 10 (30:12):
The demand is coming, in fact, it's already here, and
we're talking to the biggest companies in the world that
are investing in building these models. The two constraints that
they have right now are chips the gp use that
go into the data centers, and electricity. The US is
in a race with China for leadership in AI, and
(30:36):
both countries have strong technology bases and strong energy resources.
The challenge for us in the US is to mobilize
our energy to support the growth in power demand. We've
got a grid that is challenged in terms of putting
all that power through the grid. So what we're looking
at doing is building a large scale power generation off
(30:57):
the grid where we can go fast, we can deliver
large scale, we can take advantage of the abundant, low
cost gas resource in this country. So we're in deep
discussions with several of the biggest companies working on this.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
We have announced already a deal with Vernova and with
Engine Number one. Where is that project? When will it
first be online somewhere.
Speaker 10 (31:16):
So this is what I'm referring to. We've got a
site identified a primary site. We've got some other sites
that we're working on as well. We've got seven of
g Vernova's largest turbans coming with delivery beginning next year,
so it's to be over four gigawatts of power generation.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
When you talk about permitting, I do think about governments
federal certainly with the administrations to say, but also state.
When you talk about balance, how do you strike a
balance between noy pick names. Gavin Newsom on the one
hand in California and Donald Trump in Washington. They don't
seem to see eye to eye and energy policy.
Speaker 10 (31:49):
They probably don't see eye to eye on a number
of things, energy policy being one of them. And certainly
we've got long history in California, a large footprint in California.
But the policies are the state have been designed to
discourage investment in the traditional energy system and encourage investment
into renewables and the next generation. We talked earlier about balance.
(32:11):
My belief is California does not have the balance right.
California is trying to convert the supply side too fast
and the demand side hasn't adjusted yet, and that runs
the risk of creating shortages. I think President Trump is
more of a believer in all of the above, certainly
been an advocate for oil and gas, and I think
his policy approach is more market oriented and likely to
(32:35):
yield the kinds of results that we're talking about in
terms of competitiveness.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Give us sense how you became CEO. What brought you
Chevron to beginning with?
Speaker 10 (32:45):
I had a degree in chemical engineering, and I got
a summer job where I worked in engineering and really
enjoyed it in the early nineteen eighties. In my early twenties,
I decided to go to California. I land with Standard
Oil of California, which is what our company was own
ass at the time, and I found myself working with
incredibly talented people on important projects around the world that
(33:07):
blended engineering and technology with economics and business, and then
with this geopolitical overlay that we're talking about, and forty
three years later, I'm still doing it.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Looking back in your career, was there a formative moment
that you look back on and draw from as you
deal with crises or difficult situations.
Speaker 10 (33:26):
I'll tell you the most recent one that I learned
a lot from is COVID, and I had some insights
that this thing was perhaps going to be worse than
most people thought, and I was able to use that
to begin to mobilize a response to our company before
the rest of the world really recognized what was going on.
(33:46):
One of the first things that I did is I
called my three immediate predecessors, each of whom served as
CEO for about a decade, and all of whom lived
within a stone's throw of where I lived. And they
had gone through wars, they had gone through terrorist attacks,
financial crises, and they all had experience dealing with an
unexpected black Swan type of event. And they were incredibly
(34:06):
generous with their reflections on what they would have done differently,
their suggestions to me on what I should do in
response to it. And it was nice to not have
to figure it out all myself.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
You've been CEO for a while. What is there left
for you to accomplish?
Speaker 10 (34:23):
Well, we've got immediate integration of an acquisition. We're going
through a large corporate restructuring, which is rewiring business processes
and where work gets done. We've got a contract to
operate in Kazakhstan that runs out in the next few years.
Those would be some things that are on my list
that still need to be taken care of.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Coming up, the Lone Star State is giving New York
to Wall Street a run for its money. We look
at what Dallas is doing to become its own version
of Lower Manhattan. This is a story about ambition. They
say every thing is bigger in Texas, but for the
Lone Star State, the status quo is not big enough,
(35:05):
particularly when it comes to the financial sector. Our colleague
Scarlett Foo went to Dallas to see what it is
doing to attract Wall Street business and whether it can
handle the growth.
Speaker 11 (35:19):
When we first moved to Dallas, we lived across the
street from the kids elementary school, and I'll never forget
like walking through the park with like the ducks, and
it was like a fairy tale.
Speaker 12 (35:28):
In Dallas, I think there's no limit.
Speaker 13 (35:32):
Dallas is a great place to be.
Speaker 1 (35:33):
Dallas has long been the financial hub of Texas. Since
the pandemic, it's become a leading financial and innovation center
in the nation. According to the Census Bureau, Dallas Fort
Worth Arlington was the third largest gaining metro area in
the US from July twenty twenty three to July twenty
twenty four, adding almost one hundred and seventy thousand residents.
Speaker 14 (35:52):
I moved for work. I had a great opportunity to
join innovative company that was wanting to grow from local
to global. I was fifteen years an entrepreneur in Los
Angeles and truly thirty thousand miles a year in a
car trying to get home with the kids all that
good stuff, and I just thought there had to be
a better way. And we just started looking. And a
friend called me from here in Dallas. He says, you've
(36:14):
got to come out and take a look and see
all the things.
Speaker 10 (36:16):
That are going on here.
Speaker 14 (36:18):
And I did, and here we are eleven years later.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Sarah and Ryan Brown ditched California palm trees for Texas
tumbleweeds ten years ago, settling down in the Dallas suburb
of Highland Park.
Speaker 14 (36:29):
I see an influx of tech and tech focused entrepreneurs
and operators more and more every day. It's a hot
topic here, and I think a lot of it is
also coming because the investments that are coming here is
a tech entrepreneur or someone in tech. You don't have
to live out of your car in Silicon Valley.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
This relative affordability makes a northern Texas region a magnet
for both young people at the start of their careers
as well as established professionals. Dallas now has the second
most finance jobs in the ahead of both Chicago and
la and while it might remain some way off New York,
Mayor Eric Johnson sees his city as more than just
an upstart.
Speaker 15 (37:09):
The future is Dallas because I think this is where
the growth in the country is occurring. In terms of business,
the Sun Belt is the fastest growing part of the
United States. Texas is the fastest growing part of the
Sun Belt. Dallas is the fastest growing part of Texas.
You know, if you want to be successful, you go
where the action is headed, not where it is. I
(37:29):
think the action in this country is headed to this
part of the United States, and you can't be in
a better place than Dallas.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Financial firms are leading the action in Dallas, from Wells
Fargo topping out construction of a five hundred million dollar
campus in the inner city suburb of Irving, to Goldman
Sacks building its second biggest US headquarters downtown, to the
New York Stock Exchange moving its Chicago branch to Dallas,
culminating in what some are calling y'all street.
Speaker 14 (37:55):
Folks have been trying to figure out what to call it. Right,
you have the Texas Stock Exchange Texas, and then all
of a sudden, y'all Street came in. I think it's
going to stick.
Speaker 6 (38:05):
I think it's great.
Speaker 12 (38:06):
I still would tell my bankers, follow the money. That's
exactly what everybody's doing. The money's here.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
Elena Agatha is chairman of the Dallas Region for JP
Morgan Chase. After starting her banking career in New York,
followed by stints in London and San Francisco, she returned
home to Texas in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 12 (38:25):
As I grew with the firm, the state grew. I've
literally watched it happen, and with today thirty two thousand employees,
we have more employees in the state of Texas than
any other region for JP Morgan, including New York. Including
New York.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Agatha has seen the city of Dallas grow and stature
in the financial world. In the nineteen eighties, Michael Lewis
coined the term equities in Dallas and made that into
a shorthand for the least desirable assignment and investment bank,
the equivalent of being out of sight.
Speaker 12 (38:55):
Out of mind. Yeah anymore?
Speaker 1 (38:58):
Yeah, does anyone reference that? No, No one says that.
Speaker 12 (39:00):
No one says that anymore. But I remember that. But
no one says that anymore.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 12 (39:05):
I think because of the growth. I think the wealth,
the wealth that has been generated here today. We are
so diverse as an economy. I mean, we got smart
it's everything from tech, food, retail, huge retail. But that diversity,
it really attracted the growth that people didn't have to
(39:27):
just be an Ola Gasca to move down here years ago.
You really needed to be in New York for a
big job. That has all changed. We have lots of
jobs here in Dallas that are national jobs.
Speaker 13 (39:39):
Dallas has a lot of things going for it as
a city. Number one, there's the infrastructure here too. It's
a very business friendly environment. And three, there's that tremendous
depth of a talent pool. Young professionals are coming here
in droves. Just anecdotally. We recently had a post for
a new analyst position and had over two hundred applicants
within twenty four hours from outside of the state. Of Texas.
(40:01):
Really now, this is a career move. It is the
career move for young people to come to Dallas to
build something.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
JP Morgan isn't the only big bank betting on Dallas.
I believe you can almost see Goldman Sachs's new headquarters
from your office here.
Speaker 12 (40:14):
Oh right there, Yes, I look at it every day.
It's very annoying. No I'm chasing. But and then in
Bavay and you just see this this along this park.
The growth that has happened, and it's attracted many financial
type institutions.
Speaker 13 (40:31):
The opportunity set here in Dallas, especially in the wealth
management side, is tremendous. The number of households in our
target demographic has grown twenty percent year over year in
the last one year alone, and it's been consistent over
the last five. So I just can't imagine a better
place to do what I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Ashley Herps is the head of the Dallas market at
JP Morgan Private Bank. He is one of the city's
many recent transplants.
Speaker 13 (40:52):
We moved here for my job. The opportunity to run
JP Morgan's private bank in Dallas was an absolute dream
come true. Was a dream job, no break for our family.
It was definitely not easy. The career decision was easy,
the personal decision was harder. It's just been an incredible
place to build a career for me. Like I love
(41:12):
my job. I can't wait to get to work every day.
But my family's happy and that's really important to me
and I. I think it's a good testament to what
living in Dallas is Like.
Speaker 15 (41:21):
Dallas absolutely can handle the population growth we're experiencing.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson is quick to compare his city
with New York.
Speaker 15 (41:28):
This has been a long term, conscious effort on the
part of the city and our business community to make
sure Dallas continues to be a truly pro business city.
It's not just rhetoric. We are a sanctuary city from
socialism in this country. This is a place where we
(41:48):
still actually view business and people who create jobs and
people who contribute to the economic growth city. That's a
good thing. They're not the enemy. We're not trying to
punish them. We don't vilify them. It's just not in
our DNA like. Dallas is a city that gave the
world Texas instruments, gave the world Southwest Airlines. A lot
(42:09):
of are great fortune five cutter companies started here. We
have a culture here that really respects business.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So when it comes to financial firms, what do you
think is Dallas's biggest straw to that sector.
Speaker 15 (42:20):
We don't really feel the need to throw incentives around
to get people to invest in Dallas and to move
to Dallas and to relocate significant operations to Dallas. We
will target a big fish like a Goldman Sacks, because
then the other companies will follow. You'll create an incentive
for other financial service firms to be in that same
ecosystem with the company like a Goldman Saxe, But you
(42:43):
also will get the accounting firms, the law firms, and
it becomes sort of this virtuous cycle. So the Goldman
Sacks deals a great example of a case where they're
going to invest over half a billion dollars in an
eight hundred thousand square foot development that's going to create
five thousand jobs and it's just going to be transformative
for our city.
Speaker 1 (43:02):
Chris Kleiner. It leads Hunt Realty, which is one of
the developers behind the Goldenen Project. Hunt Realty is also
working on a massive development to the north of Dallas
with other market names. The Professional Golfers Association of America
and Universal.
Speaker 16 (43:15):
Fields is our twenty five hundred acre development in Frisco.
It's a gem amidst all the unique, positive things going
on in Frisco and Prosper and other parts North and
there was the opportunity to master plan something really special.
We set our sites to create something different, something world class.
(43:35):
The inclusion of twenty six miles of trails, the inclusion
of water, the inclusion of parks, different price point homes,
very unique, mixed use, retail, residential office development. Mass attracts mass,
and we're over a thousand homes being built. We've got
great residential home developer partners. Universal has bought one hundred acres.
(43:58):
They're going to be opening a very nique ages three
to eleven theme park here in twenty six. University of
North Texas has a Frisco campus that is adjacent to
our site. We're thrilled with the potential and we're seeing
that come to life.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Just northeast of Fields lies Prosper, another small town in
the Dallas Fort Worth area that is pitching families on
its affordability and quality of life.
Speaker 17 (44:20):
We're saying, here's this community that we have awesome amenities,
great school district. You've got space to meet people. We
have lifestyle programs. It doesn't matter where you come from.
We get a lot of people in from the West Coast,
Toyota relocation. There's been other Fortune five hundred relocation.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
David blom is president of Telesgroup. It's Winsong Range project
in Prosper is now home to some of Prosper's forty
thousand plus residents. From two thousand to twenty twenty five,
Prosper's population has grown by two thousand percent.
Speaker 17 (44:52):
It's become more diverse. And diverse as probably an overused term,
but with corporate reloca from the West Coast, we've had
people come in from the Midwest, from the northeast.
Speaker 1 (45:05):
The risk is all this growth makes Dallas and it's
surrounding suburbs less affordable.
Speaker 11 (45:10):
There was any issue that our community is facing is
that the housing prices are going up so less families
are able to afford it. So we have more seats
in our school, So that could be two ways, right,
We don't have enough funding for our school, but we
don't have crowded schools either, so I guess it's a balance.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
New residents also point out a downside of master planned
communities the limited outdoor public spaces, especially when compared with
the natural landscapes and wonders along the coasts.
Speaker 14 (45:36):
I think it's really difficult to be a weekend warrior
here on the recreation side. And when we lived in California,
we're at the ocean, we're at the beach, we're in
the mountains, we're doing everything outside. There's not a National
forest here, there's no Bureau Land Management here, and so
everything is very privatized. So I do miss the ability
to just get outside and maybe get lost.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
The growth of Dallas can't be questioned, but y'all Street
is not yet a replacement for Wall Street. While firms
are adding middle and back office jobs there, the seats
of power still reside in New York. Jamie Diamond and
the CEOs of JP Morgan's different businesses aren't likely to
move from the firm's brand new headquarters in Midtown Manhattan.
But Dallas is heading in the right direction.
Speaker 12 (46:18):
The growth just keeps happening. Our Plano office was about
six thousand when we built it, and we kept adding
to it. You need an area of the country that
can get to both coasts quickly, and this center of
the country is a huge advantage. Jamie used to tease
about the headquarters. We'll be here. No, No, it's in
New York, make no mistake. But he is very proud
(46:40):
of Texas.
Speaker 15 (46:41):
I want people to know that Dallas really is a
place where the American dream is still very much alive
and well. And it's not rhetoric, like, we really are
a place where people can come. We're not from here,
we walk come outsiders. It's a place that really embraces
energy and hard work that can do spear we have
when we see in other folks, we embrace it.
Speaker 1 (47:02):
How long will it take for Dallas to win as
a financial center.
Speaker 12 (47:06):
I think we're winning. I really think we're winning now.
With the growth. There are still people that have not
been to Texas that might have kind of an image
in their head. So I think that over the next
ten years is more people understand the sophistication. I think
that that image of Texas will continue to change.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
That does it for us Here at Wall Street Week,
I'm David Weston. See you next week for more stories
of capitalism.
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