Texas has dethroned California as the state with the most Fortune 500 companies.

The Fortune 500 list ranks the largest U.S. companies by revenue. This year, 57 of the top companies are headquartered in Texas, compared with California’s 56. It’s a reversal from two years ago when the Golden State had the pole position.

The Lone Star State was quick to claim the victory.

“Texas is the undisputed headquarters of headquarters,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a news release responding to the ranking, which was announced Wednesday. “The world’s leading businesses invest with confidence in Texas because of our welcoming business climate, predictable regulatory environment, and skilled and growing workforce. People and businesses are choosing Texas because Texas works.”

California’s corporate haters say they try to avoid the state’s high costs, income taxes and strict regulations, but the western state is still a top money maker.

“California dominates on nearly every other measure: its Fortune 500 companies are the most profitable ($647 billion), most valuable ($20 trillion), and employ more people than any other state (2.8 million workers),” Fortune said in a news release.

Indeed, despite the naysayers, Californian companies have been leading the world in developing artificial intelligence technology as well as the latest in space and defense tech.

The state is home to nearly 400 “unicorns,” or billion-dollar startups — more than any other state, according to CB Insights. It also gobbled up nearly two-thirds of U.S. venture capital last year, with San Francisco Bay Area startups such as OpenAI leading the way, according to the business information platform Crunchbase.

Texas and California have been in a tug-of-war for the crown. In 2024, after a decade, California bagged the top spot with 57 companies on the list, while Texas and New York tied in second with 52 companies each.

Healthcare giant McKesson, and oil companies Exxon Mobil and Chevron, were the top three Texas companies on the list. Apple, Alphabet, and Nvidia took the top positions in California.

Tesla, which relocated to Austin from Palo Alto in 2021, ranked 43rd on the list. Other major Fortune 500 companies that left California included Oracle, Charles Schwab and Chevron.

California’s population exodus has yet to fully recover from the pandemic times in 2020. The state’s high cost of living and regulatory environment are often cited as reasons for residents opting to move.

More recently, California’s proposal for a one-time tax on billionaires prompted some, including Peter Thiel and Larry Page, to open new offices outside the state.

Some smaller companies are also leaving the state, but nearly the same number are being set up. From 2011 to 2021, the state lost a net 2% of its total of around 47,000 headquarters, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.

“There is some indication of an uptick in headquarters leaving California, but it is really small in comparison to other firm trends,” said Sarah E. Bohn, vice president of the Public Policy Institute of California. “The rate of leaving is slightly higher among bigger firms.”

Bohn, in a recent report, cautioned that focusing solely on relocations overlooks the range of positive and negative forces driving headquarters activity and can misrepresent businesses’ desire and ability to operate headquarters in California and the broader impact on jobs.

Behind Texas and California was New York, home to 53 Fortune 500 companies this year. The fourth spot was tied between Illinois and Ohio, with 29 companies each.

Amazon was the top company on the list, ending Walmart’s 13-year reign at the top of the annual Fortune 500 companies list. Amazon’s 2025 revenue was $716.9 billion, compared with Walmart’s $713.2 billion.

Seattle-headquartered Amazon joined Exxon Mobil, General Motors, and Walmart as the only four companies to have ever held the top position since Fortune began publishing the data in 1955.

Together, the 500 companies on the list roped in $21 trillion in revenue and $2.1 trillion in profits last year, employing 30.5 million people worldwide.

Nearly 2,000 food and beverage workers at SoFi Stadium voted overwhelmingly Friday to authorize a strike just a week before the venue will stage the first World Cup game on U.S. soil in more than three decades.

Negotiations on a labor contract between Unite Here Local 11, the union representing the cooks, dishwashers, concession workers and bartenders at SoFi and, Legends Global, the stadium’s food-service operator, are expected to continue Monday despite the vote. But Kurt Petersen, the union’s co-president, said if an agreement isn’t reached workers will walk off the job and the 70,000 fans arriving for the June 12 match between the U.S. and Paraguay will be greeted by hundreds of picketers.

Union members have been working without a contract for a year and Petersen said Unite Here is demanding salary increases, protection against subcontracting and job loss through automation, and are protesting the collection of sensitive private information such as nationality and home addresses that FIFA, organizer of the World Cup, said it needs to accreditate workers.

Workers are also demanding the right to walk off the job if federal immigration enforcement enters the stadium and creates a reasonable fear for their safety. Ninety-six percent of the vote was in favor of strike authorization.

Legends Global, the stadium’s food-service operator, responded to the vote with a statement.

“Legends Global has presented progressive wage proposals to Unite Here Local 11 throughout our negotiations and remains confident an agreement is within reach,” it read. “While we expect a contract will be finalized in time, a contingency staffing plan is in place to ensure seamless operations and no disruption to fans. We remain committed to delivering an outstanding hospitality experience at the FIFA World Cup matches.”

That contingency plan would involve hiring replacement workers who would have to undergo the same detailed accreditation procedures demanded by FIFA, plus job training. SoFi Stadium is scheduled to play host to eight World Cup matches, including two of the U.S. team’s three group-stage games. The first of those is on June 12 when the U.S. faces Paraguay in its World Cup opener.

Petersen said the union is looking for “substantial increases” in hourly pay, to more than $30 an hour. Legends’ most recent proposal calls for wage freezes for some workers and a 25-cent hourly increase for cooks and dishwashers, the union said.

But perhaps the biggest sticking point is FIFA’s demand for workers’ sensitive personal information, including Social Security numbers and fingerprints, to process background checks. Under California privacy laws, workers have the right to know exactly what personal information their employer collects, how it will be used, and who it will be shared with. Local 11 said its members fears such information, if collected, could be made available to the Department of Homeland Security and ICE.

According to Petersen, when workers were originally hired by Legends they submitted the documentation necessary for employment, and under the current collective bargaining agreement the company does not have the right to request it again for FIFA.

FIFA has refused to comment on the contract talks, saying they are “between Legends Global and Unite Here Local 11.” But its insistence on collecting personal information is something Legends cannot address during contract talks, which makes a resolution impossible.

FIFA said it was partnering with the governments of the U.S., Canada and Mexico, the three countries in which the 39-day tournament will be played, “to enhance safety and security of all workers, staff, team members, vendors, journalists, volunteers, and spectators by mitigating potential insider threats. … Such name checks do not constitute pre-employment checks.”

All data collected during the name-check process, FIFA said, will be processed “in accordance with applicable data protection and privacy laws, and will be deleted by FIFA as soon as it is no longer needed for purposes of adjudicating requests for credentialed access to FIFA-controlled spaces.

TO All our colleagues at 60

FROM Lesley, Bill and Jon

We have had a hard time deciding whether to stay at 60 Minutes. We’re still deeply upset by the firings of Tanya and Draggan, strong leaders who everyone respected. As far as we can tell – because no explanation has ever been offered, they were expelled because they fought for our 60 Minutes values and stood up to protect our independence and integrity.
Newsrooms are not supposed to be run like dictatorships. Collaboration and argument are the way we have always worked at 60. Don Hewitt actually encouraged loud passionate advocacy for our pieces.

This goes for Sharyn, Cecilia and Scott as well, all at the top of the world of TV journalism who exemplified 60 Minutes’ ethos of tough questions and honest storytelling.

And Guy Campanile, an outstanding 60 Minutes producer whose advice on our stories was invaluable.

And Matt Polevoy, who ran our online operations, moved us onto YouTube, was working on developing 60 Minutes Podcasts and many other projects expanding our presence on the Web: vital and necessary for our future.

We want to express how sorry we are that these principled, fair and honest journalists were treated so shabbily, with such indecency. Tanya deserves to be celebrated, not cruelly cast off. Draggan too. It’s been heartbreaking.

But, we have decided to stay on.

We feared that our returning might be construed as an endorsement of the existing power structure. That is simply, categorically not the case.

Here’s why we’re are staying:

We don’t want to see 60 Minutes die.

We have been grieving because this whole mess has wounded and damaged the broadcast. We want to stay and fight, try to repair and preserve our reputation by continuing the Mike Wallace tradition of hold their feet to the fire as well as Morley’s brand of quirky off-kilter reports like his on why people in Finland like to tango!

1