When Lloyds TSB decided to pull out of custody last year, it recommended State Street as the preferred provider to its clients. This did not stop Chase Manhattan from eyeing up a business opportunity. The bank took aim and cherry picked prime unit trusts fund clients from the business.
"We targeted eight names with a total of £25 billion ($37.5 billion) in assets and we won six of them with assets of £21 billion so that has added substantially to our business and given us a 33% market share of the unit trust market," says Jeremy Jewitt, head of its global investor services division.
The Lloyds example provides a good illustration of Chase's attitude to custody.
While other banks have pulled out of the business, Chase remains committed. It has $1.6 trillion of cross border assets under custody, out of a total of $5.7 trillion, a figure Jewitt says is a good gauge of success.
The biggest factor in the bank's success, according to Jewitt, is that it has a clear idea of who it wants to work with. "We want to do the basics properly but we concentrate on providing a customized service to our target client base which is the larger pension funds, insurance companies, investment managers and central banks," he says.