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The Republican leader said he’s spoken to CME Group Inc., the world’s largest futures exchange, about relocating to the Lone Star State. CME and other Chicago-based trading firms have complained about a pickup in violent crime since the pandemic as well as potential tax increases floated by the mayor. “I actually have approached the CME,” Abbott said Wednesday in an interview with Bloomberg Television in New York. “There are some businesses in Chicago that are fed up.”
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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Anyone care to bet how long the CME stays in the Chitty and puts up with the crime?
I heard that the wife of someone in the C-Suite at CME was carjacked. If you’re an employee that hits home. I know a woman that works there, she goes from Union station to CME and doesn’t leave the building. What happens after another incident like that, or if someone gets hurt.
Very sad situation – hopefully she was not harmed. My wife’s niece had the same experience simply trying to get to her car to drive to work early in the morning from what was thought to be a ‘safe’ neighborhood. Thank God she was not physically harmed, but now has PTSD. Yes, it only takes one incident to go bad.
Let’s apply some objective logic to the clickbait in Crains. If the city passes a transaction tax, CME leaves. However, Pritzker has said he will veto any tax. So, that is probably out of the question no matter how much the Marxists in Chicago desire it. If Chicago increases their real estate taxes (hence their rent) and institutes a corporate head tax of $4, CME does the math to see if it makes sense to move. My guess is that it doesn’t. If crime in Chicago continues to escalate, and CME employees feel extremely threatened combined with an inability for… Read more »
I totally agree with your comment on CLT, now the 15th largest city. Very pleasant place.
The CME stays in Chicago because of inertia. It’s been here for 100 years and difficult to move. As for the LaSalle St tax, don’t forget that Fatso the Pig lies about vetos all the time (remember the fair maps thing?) and the legislature has a supermajority to override the veto. By the time this bill reaches the governor’s desk, it’s already too late. The obviously want to leave but they can’t reach a consensus where to go. Probably 1/3 wants to move to NYC, another 1/3 wants to move to a red state, with the other 1/3 vehemently against… Read more »
If CME goes, the current slow trickle of Loop businesses leaving will become a balls-out jail-break
If I’m not mistaken, didn’t the CME have their building sold not long ago? If so, that show’s action-taking-forethought that they mean it, and that they saw the writing on the wall. You know thoseTraders; always thinking ahead.
CME sold their building on Wacker and the CBOT building years ago. The board concluded they were not in the real estate business and didn’t want the CRE to be a part of the way their financial statements presented the company
The CME CEO made a public utterance that CME was well positioned for a stage left exit with very few strings attached. Not empty talk. At this point, if there is a good relocation offer from TX CME should take it.
I’d guess 1/3rd of them want to move to the NYC area to join the rest of their financial brothers.
There are some residents in Chicago that are fed up too.
Their illegal migrants come here, our businesses go there? Well, that sounds like something Illinois might pull off.
Look for the poaching to step up. CME could get a windfall on their relocation.
Yep, that’s a fact.
BJ-n-JB better pretty quickly figure out a way to be able to force businesses to pay a tax, or a fine, a fee or a bribe, before they can leave Illinois.
Can’t afford to pay ’em to stay. It’s all they have left.