State Street to buy Charles River for $2.6 billion

State Street is set to acquire investment management front-office service provider Charles River Development in a landmark $2.6 billion deal.

The acquisition will significantly boost the custodian’s front office capabilities for asset managers through Charles River’s automated provisions.

The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year.

State Street said it expects the acquisition to be accretive in 2020 and offers “long-term revenue growth”.

“Today’s announcement represents an important milestone in our digital and technology transformation aimed at providing clients with differentiated solutions and data. This acquisition will also enable us to address a large adjacent $8 billion revenue pool for front office services,” said Jay Hooley, chairman and CEO of State Street.

“Clients today want solutions that can add value and achieve efficiencies from portfolio modeling and construction all the way through to custody as they face increasing complexity and regulatory expectations, and the need to manage costs and achieve product or geographic expansion.”

Charles River serves more than 300 clients across institutional, wealth, asset owner and alternative market segments, including 49 of the top 100 asset managers that in aggregate have more than $25 trillion in assets under management. The firm recorded revenues of more than $300 million in 2017.

“State Street is an ideal partner for us as we share a common focus on helping clients achieve better investment outcomes,” said Charles River Development CEO Peter Lambertus. “We are excited about the opportunities ahead and what the combination of our two firms can do for the industry overall.”

State Street has been relatively quiet on the acquisitions front in the past few years, compared to its activity throughout the rest of the 2000s. 

The buy-side arm of the business acquired the asset management business of General Electric back in 2016, however the last service offering acquisitions came in 2012 when it bought the fund administration unit of Goldman Sachs for $550 million.

Prior to that, the custodian bank had landed deals for Deutsche Bank’s securities services business in 2003 and Investors Bank & Trust in 2007.