On a Tuesday in late February, American Express CEO Stephen Squeri stood before a podium at 200 Vesey Street and announced the company would anchor 2 World Trade Center. The commitment ended a 14-year construction freeze on the 55-story supertall designed by Norman Foster. Silverstein Properties now has the final piece of the 16-acre World Trade Center complex under active construction.
Larry Silverstein, now 95, has pursued this tower since 2006. The original design by Foster was scrapped in 2011 after no anchor tenant materialized. A Bjarke Ingels redesign followed in 2015, then stalled. Silverstein returned to Foster in 2021. American Express signed on February 25, 2026. The building will yield 1.95 million rentable square feet across 55 stories, rising 1,226 feet above the Financial District.
American Express plans to consolidate its global headquarters at the tower, moving from its current home at 200 Vesey Street, where it has been since 1986. The company expects to house 10,000 employees in flexible floor arrangements. The building will include six landscaped loggia terraces totaling more than one acre of outdoor space. It will be fully electric and pursue LEED certification.
Construction crews have already removed temporary wooden covers from the one-story superstructure that sat idle since 2012. White fencing is up along Greenwich and Vesey Streets. A telescopic crane is on site. Tower cranes will follow as the building ascends. Completion is slated for 2031.
The project is projected to create 3,200 direct and indirect construction jobs. Silverstein Properties estimates a $5.9 billion contribution to New York City's economy and $6.3 billion to New York State's. Those numbers assume a full build-out and tenant fit-out cycle over the next five years.
The anchor tenant commitment changes the risk profile. American Express carries an A2 credit rating from Moody's and reported $60 billion in revenue for 2025. The company signed a long-term lease for the majority of the rentable square footage, per Silverstein's announcement. That removes the speculative office exposure that killed the previous two attempts.
2 World Trade Center is the last undeveloped site at the World Trade Center complex. The 16-acre site now includes the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, the Transportation Hub, and towers 1, 3, 4, and 7. Tower 1, also designed by Foster, opened in 2014 and is 94% leased, per Silverstein's 2025 investor presentation. Tower 3 is 97% leased. Tower 4 is 99% leased.
The Financial District office market has tightened. Average asking rent hit $82 per square foot in Q1 2026, per CBRE data, up 8% year-over-year. Vacancy fell to 14.2%, the lowest since 2019. The flight-to-quality dynamic favors new construction with modern HVAC, higher floor plates, and sustainability credentials. 2 World Trade Center checks all three.
The 2031 completion date is a long horizon. That is five years from today. Interest rate expectations could shift twice over that period. The current SOFR forward curve implies a 3.5% terminal rate by 2028, per CME data. Construction financing terms will matter. Silverstein has not disclosed the capital stack for this phase.
American Express's commitment signals something broader. The largest corporate tenants are voting with their balance sheets. They want new, efficient, amenitized space in dense urban cores. They are willing to commit early and wait. That is a bet on the long-term value of central business district office assets.
The tower's stepped massing and staggered terraces are not just architectural gestures. They create 1.2 acres of outdoor space across six levels. That is a leasing differentiator in a market where wellness and air quality rank high on corporate RFPs. The fully electric design also hedges against future carbon regulation. New York City's Local Law 97 imposes escalating fines on buildings exceeding emissions caps. 2 World Trade Center will start compliant.
Silverstein Properties has now delivered every tower in the World Trade Center master plan except this one. The company has navigated two anchor tenant failures, a global pandemic, and a rate cycle that crushed speculative office development. It now has a credit tenant, a construction start, and a clear path to completion. The final piece of the 16-acre puzzle is finally rising.