Texas Commerce Bank

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The Texas Commerce Bank (officially Texas Commerce Bank N.A.^[1], with its parent bank holding company known as Texas Commerce Bancshares, Inc.) was a Texas-based bank acquired by Chemical Banking Corporation of New York in May 1987. The acquisition of Texas Commerce Bank represented the largest interstate banking merger in history at the time with a purchase price of $1.2 billion.^{[citation needed]} The bank had its headquarters in what is now the JPMorgan Chase Building (formerly Gulf Building) in downtown Houston, Texas.^[2]

Prior to the merger, interstate banking was illegal in Texas and many other states,^[3] which effectively prevented such cross-border mergers. Texas and New York had changed their laws to allow a merger of an in-state bank and an out-of-state bank. Without those changes to the law, the merger between Chemical Bank and Texas Commerce Bank, and later Chase Manhattan Bank would not have been possible.^[4]

Through a series of mergers and acquisitions Chemical Bank bought Chase Manhattan Bank and then JP Morgan finally changed Texas Commerce to JPMorgan Chase & Co.