State of Texas

The Texas Water Development Board expects to sell up to $1.8 billion of tax-exempt and taxable bonds in September.

Overall state general fund revenue is on track with an October estimate, while the projection for the fiscal 2024-2025 yearend balance faces changes.

The state's new law requires companies like investment banks to provide written verification of their positions, part of a trend among similar bills aimed at preventing Wall Street banks from lying about their positions, said a firearms industry lobbyist.

Its state university systems face a funding freeze for noncompliance with a 2023 state law banning diversity, equity, and inclusion offices.

The state's transportation commission took action to end a comprehensive development agreement for a partially bond-financed toll lane project on State Highway 288.

Laws banning banks from underwriting municipal bond deals because of their fossil fuel or firearm policies dramatically boosted underwriting spreads, a business group's study said.

The state faces slower job growth after gains in the previous three years outpaced the nation, according to the Dallas Federal Reserve's Texas economic outlook.

Barclays joins UBS and Citigroup in being prohibited from underwriting state and local government bonds under Texas laws aimed at protecting the fossil fuel and firearms industries.

Half of the top 10 issuers were new entrants: the California Community Choice Finance Authority, Main Street Natural Gas, the state of Washington, the Texas Natural Gas Securitization Finance Corp. and Illinois.

Municipal bond issuance in the Lone Star State totaled $59 billion in 2023, spurred by utility rate securitizations and school bonds.