Houston investors back new platform for retail traders looking to follow financial influencers

making a splash

CashPool is a new mobile platform that gives everyday investors the opportunity to derive influence from the investment strategies and trades made by trusted and influential stock traders. Photo via joinmypool.co

As anyone who witnessed the impact Gamestop's meme stock had on the country already realizes, influential investors can drive momentum within the financial sector. And one company with fresh funding from a Houston firm is betting on that exactly.

CashPool is a new mobile platform that gives everyday investors the opportunity to derive influence from the investment strategies and trades made by trusted and influential stock traders who have built substantial followings on social media platforms. By allowing retail traders the chance to join social media influencers’ various “pools” on its platform, CashPool is primed to change the way the masses acquire wealth.

This is the kind of algorithmic trading aimed at a new generation of investors that gets the attention of early-stage venture capital funds like Houston-based Ten X Labs, a pre-seed angel fund that recently invested in CashPool to help the trading platform continue its mission of transforming the investment landscape.

"We are thrilled to receive funding from Ten X Labs, as it validates our innovative approach to trading and investing," CashPool Founder and CEO Averett Barksdale says in a news release. "This investment will enable us to further enhance our platform, expand our user base and continue to revolutionize the industry. We believe that everyone should have transparent, governed access to profitable trading and investment opportunities, and through CashPool we are making that vision a reality."

Connecting the dots

CashPool is broker agnostic connector, allowing its users to keep their current brokers like Robinhood, Coinbase, Charles Schwab, Acorns, Fidelity, ETRADE, Stash, Sofi and Betterment and creates a seamless investment experience.

“We are that middle piece,” says Barksdale. “So your money stays on whatever brokerage you’ve connected to the platform, and we just execute the trades on your brokerage for you.”

Considering that users’ money remains with their original brokerage, how does CashPool monetize its platform?

“We don’t charge users to execute trades,” says Barksdale. “We charge per pool you join. So, on our platform, strategies are called pools and a user can join as many strategies as they want.”

Financial influencers set the strategies. These are profitable traders who have become influencers on various social media platforms and built-up followings comprised of people who are or are desiring to be retail traders themselves.

“There are a ton of people out there who actually are profitable traders,” says Barksdale. “Same as what we saw happen with GameStop and the whole Reddit situation. That was a financial influencer, right? It just so happens that he had a strategy that he thought would work and it turned out for a while it did work, right?

“We want to not only empower the retail trader, but empower these financial influencers who are profitable as well. Just because it's a whole marketplace out there for it. But a lot of times the retail trader doesn't quite understand who to go with. On our platform, you could see the results of these financial influencers right before your eyes on our platform. So you can see if they're profitable or not, or if someone's just on Instagram or whatever, social media platform posting screenshots but aren’t actually executing those trades.”

Increasing transparency

With trading, past success can be an arbiter for future performance, so with CashPool, users can choose to join the pools of influencers who have documented success as a trader on the platform.

“On our platform you can't hide,” says Barksdale. “We're connected to their brokerage account, so we see what trades they're making in real time. We also see their performance in real time, and we display that on the platform. That's something that you really can't get around. So if someone on Instagram says they traded this stock, then I made X amount of dollars and had this percentage of return, then you go to the platform and look at your pool and see they didn't do that and were lying the whole time, it’s literally just putting everything out there in the open. We have the kind of transparency that doesn't exist currently right now in the space.”

Broadcasting one’s successes is easy, but what about the losses?

“I thought it was going to be a lot more difficult just thinking, do people really want to show what they're doing?” says Barksdale. “But the thing that I've seen is a lot of these traders are a whole lot more competitive. And the traders who are doing it, they're constantly talking out against people who aren't actually doing it in real life.

“A lot of the traders who are actually profitable, they do live trades every day. But how do users if they should pay to get into a specific trader’s live trading session? Like, how do they know they're profitable already?

“On CashPool, users can see an actual influencer's win rate and say, 'Okay, 86 percent of the time they are profitable, and I could see how many trades they've made in total.' From that standpoint, users can make an educated decision on what pools to join and pay for.”

CashPool users can join as many pools as they see fit, but the cost of each pool’s membership may vary due to the popularity or success percentage rate of the financial influencer.

“You can join as many pools as you want, but what we suggest is you start by joining the pools of influencers that you already follow and trust, that you're already following like on Twitter or YouTube or Instagram or whatever it may be,” says Barksdale. “We are suggesting that you follow them first and you join their pools first. What we do is on the monetization side is we allow the creators on our platform who are the influencers to set their own price for their pool.”

Building a secure network

Outside of who or what to follow, information security is likely a concern for potential users. Financial influencers’ trade information is readily available (win percentages and number of trades, not dollar amounts), but users’ won’t be able to see other users’ information on the platform.

“Currently, we have a list of 10 brokerages who are on board, and then we're working to onboard more as we keep going on,” says Barksdale. “So, we have like your Interactive brokerages, and we also have a few other ones that are UK specific and Canada specific. We would love to have every single brokerage on the platform, but unfortunately, there are a couple that are still kind of playing hard to get, so to speak.”

The first rollout of CashPool is set, but version two will likely include content creation from the financial influencers.

Barksdale, who has a background in product development and experience working at companies like Charles Schwab and Fidelity, is mostly excited about the prospect of CashPool unlocking expert financial strategies for everyone, not just the financial advisors behind the closed doors of Wall Street.

“Yes, my philosophy is that financial health and financial growth should be accessible for all,” says Barksdale. “The thing that gets me is it needs to be responsible. So, for example, RobinHood is a platform that doesn't necessarily care if you are making responsible decisions, they just care that you're trading on that platform.

“Our platform is strictly focused on actually being the place where these retail traders can make responsible decisions centered around investing and trading.”

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Autonomous truck company rolls out driverless Houston-Dallas route

up and running

Houston is helping drive the evolution of self-driving freight trucks.

In October, Aurora opened a more than 90,000-square-foot terminal at a Fallbrook Drive logistics hub in northwest Houston to support the launch of its first “lane” for driverless trucks—a Houston-to-Dallas route on the Interstate 45 corridor. Aurora opened its Dallas-area terminal in April and the company began regular driverless customer deliveries between the two Texas cities on April 27.

Close to half of all truck freight in Texas moves along I-45 between Houston and Dallas.

“Now, we are the first company to successfully and safely operate a commercial driverless trucking service on public roads. Riding in the back seat for our inaugural trip was an honor of a lifetime – the Aurora Driver performed perfectly and it’s a moment I’ll never forget,” Chris Urmson, CEO and co-founder of Pittsburgh-based Aurora, said in a news release.

Aurora produces software that controls autonomous vehicles and is known for its flagship product, the Aurora Driver. The software is installed in Volvo and Paccar trucks, the latter of which includes brands like Kenworth and Peterbilt.

Aurora previously hauled more than 75 loads per week under the supervision of vehicle operators from Houston to Dallas and Fort Worth to El Paso for customers in its pilot project, including FedEx, Uber Freight and Werner. To date, it has completed over 1,200 miles without a driver.

The company launched its new Houston to Dallas route with customers Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines, which ran supervised commercial pilots with Aurora.

“Transforming an old school industry like trucking is never easy, but we can’t ignore the safety and efficiency benefits this technology can deliver. Autonomous trucks aren’t just going to help grow our business – they’re also going to give our drivers better lives by handling the lengthier and less desirable routes,” Richard Stocking, CEO of Hirschbach Motor Lines, added in the statement.

The company plans to expand its service to El Paso and Phoenix by the end of 2025.

“These new, autonomous semis on the I-45 corridor will efficiently move products, create jobs, and help make our roadways safer,” Gov. Greg Abbott added in the release. “Texas offers businesses the freedom to succeed, and the Aurora Driver will further spur economic growth and job creation in Texas. Together through innovation, we will build a stronger, more prosperous Texas for generations.”

In July, Aurora said it raised $820 million in capital to fuel its growth—growth that’s being accompanied by scrutiny.

In light of recent controversies surrounding self-driving vehicles, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, whose union members include over-the-road truckers, recently sent a letter to Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick calling for a ban on autonomous vehicles in Texas.

“The Teamsters believe that a human operator is needed in every vehicle—and that goes beyond partisan politics,” the letter states. “State legislators have a solemn duty in this matter to keep dangerous autonomous vehicles off our streets and keep Texans safe. Autonomous vehicles are not ready for prime time, and we urge you to act before someone in our community gets killed.”

Houston cell therapy company launches second-phase clinical trial

fighting cancer

A Houston cell therapy company has dosed its first patient in a Phase 2 clinical trial. March Biosciences is testing the efficacy of MB-105, a CD5-targeted CAR-T cell therapy for patients with relapsed or refractory CD5-positive T-cell lymphoma.

Last year, InnovationMap reported that March Biosciences had closed its series A with a $28.4 million raise. Now, the company, co-founded by Sarah Hein, Max Mamonkin and Malcolm Brenner, is ready to enroll a total of 46 patients in its study of people with difficult-to-treat cancer.

The trial will be conducted at cancer centers around the United States, but the first dose took place locally, at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. Dr. Swaminathan P. Iyer, a professor in the department of lymphoma/myeloma at MD Anderson, is leading the trial.

“This represents a significant milestone in advancing MB-105 as a potential treatment option for patients with T-cell lymphoma who currently face extremely limited therapeutic choices,” Hein, who serves as CEO, says. “CAR-T therapies have revolutionized the treatment of B-cell lymphomas and leukemias but have not successfully addressed the rarer T-cell lymphomas and leukemias. We are optimistic that this larger trial will further validate MB-105's potential to address the critical unmet needs of these patients and look forward to reporting our first clinical readouts.”

The Phase 1 trial showed promise for MB-105 in terms of both safety and efficacy. That means that potentially concerning side effects, including neurological events and cytokine release above grade 3, were not observed. Those results were published last year, noting lasting remissions.

In January 2025, MB-105 won an orphan drug designation from the FDA. That results in seven years of market exclusivity if the drug is approved, as well as development incentives along the way.

The trial is enrolling its single-arm, two-stage study on ClinicalTrials.gov. For patients with stubborn blood cancers, the drug is providing new hope.

Elon Musk's SpaceX site officially becomes the city of Starbase, Texas

Starbase, Texas

The South Texas home of Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket company is now an official city with a galactic name: Starbase.

A vote Saturday, May 3, to formally organize Starbase as a city was approved by a lopsided margin among the small group of voters who live there and are mostly Musk’s employees at SpaceX. With all the votes in, the tally was 212 in favor to 6 against, according to results published online by the Cameron County Elections Department.

Musk celebrated in a post on his social platform, X, saying it is “now a real city!”

Starbase is the facility and launch site for the SpaceX rocket program that is under contract with the Department of Defense and NASA that hopes to send astronauts back to the moon and someday to Mars.

Musk first floated the idea of Starbase in 2021 and approval of the new city was all but certain. Of the 283 eligible voters in the area, most are believed to be Starbase workers.

The election victory was personal for Musk. The billionaire’s popularity has diminished since he became the chain-saw-wielding public face of President Donald Trump’s federal job and spending cuts, and profits at his Tesla car company have plummeted.

SpaceX has generally drawn widespread support from local officials for its jobs and investment in the area.

But the creation of an official company town has also drawn critics who worry it will expand Musk’s personal control over the area, with potential authority to close a popular beach and state park for launches.

Companion efforts to the city vote include bills in the state Legislature to shift that authority from the county to the new town’s mayor and city council.

All these measures come as SpaceX is asking federal authorities for permission to increase the number of South Texas launches from five to 25 a year.

The city at the southern tip of Texas near the Mexico border is only about 1.5 square miles (3.9 square kilometers), crisscrossed by a few roads and dappled with airstream trailers and modest midcentury homes.

SpaceX officials have said little about exactly why they want a company town and did not respond to emailed requests for comment.

“We need the ability to grow Starbase as a community,” Starbase General Manager Kathryn Lueders wrote to local officials in 2024 with the request to get the city issue on the ballot.

The letter said the company already manages roads and utilities, as well as “the provisions of schooling and medical care” for those living on the property.

SpaceX officials have told lawmakers that granting the city authority to close the beach would streamline launch operations. SpaceX rocket launches and engine tests, and even just moving certain equipment around the launch base, requires the closure of a local highway and access to Boca Chica State Park and Boca Chica Beach.

Critics say beach closure authority should stay with the county government, which represents a broader population that uses the beach and park. Cameron County Judge Eddie Trevino, Jr. has said the county has worked well with SpaceX and there is no need for change.

Another proposed bill would make it a Class B misdemeanor with up to 180 days in jail if someone doesn’t comply with an order to evacuate the beach.

The South Texas Environmental Justice Network, which has organized protests against the city vote and the beach access issue, held another demonstration Saturday that attracted dozens of people.

Josette Hinojosa, whose young daughter was building a sandcastle nearby, said she was taking part to try to ensure continued access to a beach her family has enjoyed for generations.

With SpaceX, Hinojosa said, “Some days it’s closed, and some days you get turned away."

Organizer Christopher Basaldú, a member of the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation of Texas tribe, said his ancestors have long been in the area, where the Rio Grande meets the Gulf.

“It’s not just important,” he said, “it’s sacred.”

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