After a brief hiatus where State Street won the award for leading custody bank in 2002, JPMorgan has returned to the top of the tree, landing its third award in four years.
State Street, the world's largest player by assets under custody, and Bank of New York, the custody specialist, remain fierce competitors. State Street further bolstered its presence with its $1.5 billion purchase of Deutsche Bank's custody business, in the process leapfrogging Bank of New York to become the biggest player, with nearly $8 trillion of custody assets.
However, as marked out by Euromoney's sister magazine, Global Investor, in its annual global custody survey, JPMorgan continues to rank highest among the big boys when the leading institutional investor clients' opinions are given greatest weight. Its closest competition comes from the smaller boutique custody players of Investors Bank & Trust and Brown Brothers Harriman. Discounting those two, JPMorgan continues to rule the roost.
And, though not landing a deal of the size of State Street's Deutsche purchase, or BNY's $2 billion acquisition of Pershing from Credit Suisse, JPMorgan did make smaller deals in the shape of Plexus, the transaction cost analysis firm.