2007 NEWS archive

© JLG Enterprises 1998-2009

20DEC07: The Bank of New York Mellon has completed its acquisition of ABN AMRO Mellon Global Securities Services B.V., following regulatory approval from the Dutch regulator, De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB). Terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

ABN AMRO Mellon, the 50/50 joint venture company established by Mellon and ABN AMRO in 2003, will now be known as BNY Mellon Asset Servicing B.V. and becomes a part of the asset servicing division of The Bank of New York Mellon. The bank will continue to have its headquarters in Amsterdam, regulated by DNB. Existing ABN AMRO Mellon clients will be contracted to BNY Mellon Asset Servicing B.V.

ABN AMRO Mellon CEO Nadine Chakar takes up a new position as chair of the supervisory board of BNY Mellon Asset Servicing B.V. She continues in her role as head of Europe, Middle East and Africa for BNY Mellon’s asset servicing business. The role of CEO of BNY Mellon Asset Servicing B.V. is taken up by Pim Nederpel. Nederpel has been ABN AMRO Mellon’s chief financial officer since October 2005. The bank’s existing managing board structure will remain in place.

20DEC07: Northern Trust has appointed Rohan Singh to the newly created position of head of Asia Pacific sales, to manage new business development opportunities across the region. He is based in Singapore. Singh has 14 years of securities services experience and joins Northern Trust from Citigroup, where he was most recently a director and head of sales for South East Asia.

Singh will manage the asset servicing sales team comprised of Alex Tobing, focusing on South East Asia, and Jeremy Hester, who has recently taken on a new role with responsibility for marketing Northern Trust’s asset servicing capabilities to institutional investors and fund managers in Australia and New Zealand. Hester has been with Northern Trust since 1994 and was most recently responsible for sales and marketing of the bank’s asset servicing capabilities, including custody and fund administration in the UK, Dublin and Luxembourg, to fund managers. Hester will remain based in London.

19DEC07: Citi has been appointed by Eksportfinans, the Norwegian export credit agency, as its global and US direct custodian for USD12bn of assets.

18DEC07: RBC Dexia has been selected by AXA Australia to provide custody services for the company's new superannuation and pension platform, called 'North'. This is an expansion of the existing working relationship between the two companies. RBC Dexia currently provides custody services for AXA Australia's 'Summit' and 'Generations' platforms.

18DEC07: JPMorgan has opened an office in Luxembourg to service hedge funds and funds of hedge funds clients, providing custody, administration, accounting and outsourcing services. The operation will be run by Mario Pirola, who will work with Sanjiv Sawhney, head of JPMorgan’s Luxembourg office.

13DEC07: Banco Popolare Scarl, the third largest banking group in Italy, has expanded its existing custody relationship Citi to include the assets of the bank’s institutional asset manager clients. “Over the years, Citi has demonstrated it is a provider who meets Banco Popolare Scarl’s objectives of increasing operational efficiencies while providing economies of scale. We are delighted to continue doing business with them,” said Mariateresa Chiecchi, head of administration services at Banco Popolare Societa' di Servizi.

13DEC07: The Bank of New York Mellon has appointed Jai Arya as head of client management for Asia. He will continue to be based in Singapore and will report to Ken Lopian, senior executive vice president and head of developing markets, who is based in New York. Arya has been with the company since 1986 in a variety of roles in India, Taiwan, Korea and Singapore. Most recently he was head of client management for the Southern Asia region.

11DEC07: CIBC Mellon has been appointed by Morguard Financial Corporation to provide fund administration, unitholder recordkeeping, global custody and foreign exchange services for the company's new pooled funds. Established in 1975, Morguard is one of Canada's leading real estate investment and management companies. With more than CAD7.9bn in assets under management, Morguard provides real estate portfolio, asset, and property management services.

11DEC07: Depozitarul Central S.A., the Romanian central securities depository, has appointed Citi to provide international settlements through its local market infrastructure. The service will enable members of Depozitarul Central S.A. to settle international securities dual-listed in Romania and subsequently international securities listed on other global regulated markets.

07DEC07: As far as influential industry surveys are concerned, BNY Mellon has failed its first test as a new provider with a commitment to service excellence. In the 2007 R&M UK Depositary/Trustee Survey, conducted during September and October, BNY Mellon was the only provider to record a lower score than in 2006, slipping in the process from third to sixth place. One respondent said of BNY Mellon: “We would criticise their approach as commercially naive, tending towards unhelpful. We did not always get the support that we felt, both at the time and with hindsight, we should. While the overall performance is good, these instances are not forgettable and colour an otherwise satisfactory picture”. Other respondents raised concerns about BNY Mellon’s ability to support new products, especially those involving derivatives. BNY Mellon has set itself some tough service quality goals, aiming to become top amongst its peer group in the three major independent industry surveys, one of which is the R&M Global Custody Survey, due out in the first quarter of 2008.

HSBC has retained its top position for the second year running, building on its previous score. “I believe HSBC go to great lengths to add value for their customers,” said one client. “HSBC have continued to provide an excellent service and have demonstrated that they are continuing to look for ways to further improve year on year. Their relationship management remains first class while provision of technical advice, while already very good, looks set to further improve in 2008,” said another.

2007 R&M UK Depositary/Trustee Survey

© R&M Surveys Ltd.

2007 R&M Dublin Trustee Survey

In Dublin, BNY Mellon is faring better, coming in ahead of last year’s combined score of the two newly merged banks. JPMorgan jumped three places to head the 2007 R&M Dublin Trustee Survey. The survey, which measures service levels offered by trustees in Dublin to fund promoters that are not associated with the banks through ownership, also saw a significant improvement in HSBC’s performances and declines for both Citi and State Street.

© R&M Surveys Ltd.

04DEC07: BNY Mellon has been selected as overseas custodian for China International Fund Management Co.’s (CIFM) Asia Pacific Advantage Fund. CIFM is the fourth fund management company to receive a QDII (qualified domestic institutional investor) licence. The fund will invest in international markets including Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Australia and India. The fund raised a record RMB116 billion (USD15.4bn) during the initial subscription period, well in excess of its USD4bn cap. Earlier this month BNY Mellon announced a QDII custody mandate from Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.

04DEC07: CACEIS, the French administration specialist, has completed its acquisition of Olympia Capital International, the alternative investment fund administration specialist. Olympia Capital administers some USD70bn in assets for funds domiciled in Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, the British Virgin Islands, Ireland and the United States. Olympia Capital activities will remain managed in the US by Barbara Lewnowski, in Bermuda and Canada by Raymond Morrison and in Ireland by John Walley. In the near future, the Irish fund administration activities of Olympia Capital and CACEIS will be merged.

04DEC07: Société Générale has completed its acquisition of the fund administration and middle and back office services of Pioneer Investments in Germany, a subsidiary of Pioneer Global Asset Management S.p.A. The entity resulting from this acquisition, Société Générale Securities Services Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH, will have around 180 employees. Clients for the activities acquired by SGSS in Munich include Pioneer Investments and other German fund managers. The related funds under administration amount to EUR52bn.

Juergen Scharfenorth, who was previously CEO of SG’s fund administration activities in Germany, will be CEO of the new entity, reporting to Serge Jacqueline, Head of fund administration for SG.

04DEC07: Andrew Smith, currently head of sales in the Americas for Citi’s securities and fund services business (SFS), has been appointed head of North America SFS. In his new role, Smith will manage SFS product and sales in the region, reporting jointly to Julie Monaco, regional head of global transaction services for North America, and Neeraj Sahai, global head of securities and fund services. Smith replaces Chandresh Iyer, who recently assumed the role of global product head of investment administration services, which focuses on middle-office services and structured solutions.

30NOV07: HSBC Securities Services has appointed Owain McNeill as business development manager and Nicholas Wheatley as manager within the fund services business development area. Wheatley joins from Morgan Stanley’s international prime brokerage business in London. McNeill is a founding member of a successful software company and has worked for YouDevise Limited and Tenfold Systems UK Ltd.

30NOV07: Thomas Murray, the custodian risk rating and advisory specialist, has been appointed by The World Bank Treasury to provide advisory services during its custodian selection process for its asset management business, as well as advisory services for the planning, implementation and transition of custody and related services.

“The external perspective and subject matter expertise that Thomas Murray is providing to our selection committee is very important,” said Diann Martin, director, treasury operations. “Our objective is to select the best qualified custodian that can service our domestic and global fixed income portfolios, and strategically position The World Bank Treasury Asset Management business for future growth.”

28NOV07: Northern Trust has appointed Sue Baines as head of global fund services (GFS) sales for Europe, Middle East and Africa, and John Grundy as a GFS sales manager. Baines continues to report to Anne-Lise Winge, head of asset servicing sales for EMEA and Asia Pacific at Northern Trust. Baines joined Northern Trust in 2005 as a business development manager focusing on GFS sales. She initially shared a senior sales management role with Jeremy Hester, who is understood to have taken a new sales position focusing on Australia and New Zealand.

Additionally, John Grundy has joined Northern Trust to sell to traditional and hedge fund managers, reporting to Baines. Grundy spent eight years at Thomson Financial where he was a senior sales executive focusing on the investment management and hedge fund community.

28NOV07: State Street has been appointed to provide investment services for EUR620m in pension fund assets of Royal Cosun, a food producer in the Netherlands. State Street will provide Royal Cosun’s three pension funds with global custody, accounting, regulatory reporting, and performance measurement and analytics services. KAS BANK is the outgoing custodian.

28NOV07: Citi has launched direct custody and clearing services in Morocco, expanding the firm’s proprietary network to 50 markets.

26NOV07: As first reported on this service in August, Richard Hale has been appointed European head of business development for asset managers, insurance and related financial companies at JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services. Hale joins from HSBC and will report to Francis Jackson, head of client management and business development. Hale’s team is expected to grow over the next year to include a total of six salespeople.

23NOV07: Northern Trust has strengthened its client relationship management and sales teams for the Nordic market.

Neill McVity and Jane Porter join as senior relationship managers while Joanie Stringer has been appointed as Nordic sales manager, all within Northern Trust’s asset servicing group. McVity joins from JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services where he was responsible for client management and new business development. He spent 19 years at JPMorgan in corporate banking and global custody roles, and has worked exclusively in Nordic client management and new business development for the past six years. Porter has been with Northern Trust since 1997. She transfers to the Nordic sales team from Northern Trust’s Dublin office, where she was a relationship manager responsible for a number of Irish pension fund clients and clients who have launched tax-transparent pooling vehicles with Northern Trust.

Stringer is responsible for Nordic business development, reporting to Damian Powell, who was recently appointed as head of EMEA institutional sales for the asset servicing group. She has transferred to London from Northern Trust Bank FSB in New York where she had a business development role.

23NOV07: GlobeOp Financial Services is launching an integrated UCITS 3 outsourcing solution for mutual funds and custodian banks that provides independent daily valuation and risk reporting for OTC derivatives.

An automated plug-and-play solution for OTC processing, GoOTC incorporates standardised data and processes to reduce operational and settlement risks related to inaccurate trade entry, reconciliation and liquidity. In addition, GoOTC provides online access to critical data for fund risk managers and financial control teams. To help funds demonstrate their ability to monitor and measure position and portfolio risk whenever necessary, as required by UCITS 3, GoRisk Reports provides a comprehensive ASP risk reporting service. Reports, that can be tailored to specific fund requirements, include: position, liquidity and exposure; scenario analysis and stress test limits; correlation analysis; and VAR.

20NOV07: RBC Dexia has been selected by Maple-Brown Abbott Funds PLC to provide global custody, fund administration and shareholder services for a newly-launched family of funds domiciled in Dublin. This mandate marks the expansion of an existing working relationship between RBC Dexia and Maple-Brown Abbott in Australia.

Maple-Brown Abbott was established in 1984 and is wholly owned by the founders, directors and staff. Funds under management as at 30 June 2007 were AUD19.4bn.

20NOV07: Société Générale Securities Services has appointed Jean Cadroy as director of information services, which employs over 1,000 staff. Based in Paris, Cadroy will be a member of the SGSS executive committee. Since 2004, he was head of IT for the outsourcing partnership between State Street and AXA Investment Managers.

20NOV07: Cayman National Securities has selected RBC Dexia as custodian and securities lending provider. “The key reasons behind this decision included RBC Dexia's strong reputation for excellent service and their proven approach to managing risk on behalf of their institutional clients,” said Jay Schutte, senior vice-president of operations for Cayman National Securities.

19NOV07: State Street has hired Caroline Carmichael as a senior vice president in its relationship management group. Based in Boston, Carmichael will be responsible for overseeing relationships with several of State Street’s global customers. She will report to Bob Tarter, executive vice president and head of relationship management.

Prior to joining State Street, Carmichael spent more than 12 years at Brown Brothers Harriman, where she was a senior vice president and West Coast global sales and relationship manager.

19NOV07: HSBC Securities Services has appointed Sanjay Jayant as head of product strategy for institutional fund services (IFS) reporting to Clare Fraser, global head of strategy for IFS. Jayant previously worked with RBC Dexia Investor Services and Citi.

15NOV07: JPMorgan is to provide portfolio administration and performance reporting for the State of Michigan Department of Treasury Bureau of Investments’ alternative investments division. The value of holdings has not been disclosed. The services include investment accounting, cash flow tracking and forecasting, reporting and analytics.

15NOV07: RBC Dexia has been selected by SEAMARK Asset Management to service the company's newly-launched family of mutual funds. Services include custody, fund administration, recordkeeping, foreign exchange and securities lending.

“After conducting a comprehensive assessment of the capabilities and offerings of the various investor services providers in the Canadian market, we concluded that RBC Dexia was the company most closely aligned with our long-term business objectives,” said Stuart Raftus, CEO of SEAMARK. “We were particularly impressed with RBC Dexia's ability to combine a global product offering with a dedicated, local service team in Halifax.”

15NOV07: Paul McDonough has joined Northern Trust as a vice president and sales manager in the North American asset servicing sales team, based in Chicago and focused on foundation and endowment clients. McDonough comes to Northern Trust from JPMorgan in Columbus, Ohio, where he was a vice president in the worldwide securities services sales team.

15NOV07: Advent Software has announced new appointments in EMEA. Hakan Valberg has been appointed senior vice president and general manager for Advent in EMEA. Valberg joined Advent in 2003. Roger Klausen, who has been with the firm since 1999, has been appointed vice president, client services, and Lars Mellgren has joined Advent as client support manager.

15NOV07: Northern Trust has expanded its asset servicing sales and relationship management teams in EMEA.

Damian Powell has been appointed as head of EMEA institutional sales, a new position. Powell joins from SUNGARD, where he was UK general manager for the advanced private banking system business, and director of wealth management sales. Rhonda Zoef joins as UK pension fund sales manager, reporting to Powell. Zoef joins from Citigroup where she was a sales manager in the Diners Club corporate card division in Sydney.

These appointments follow those of Cristina Quazzo and Anita Weiss, who joined Northern Trust’s asset servicing client service team earlier in 2007. Both were appointed as senior relationship managers, focusing on UK pension funds. Quazzo joined from HSBC Private Banking, where she was head of the US desk for private clients. Weiss recently transferred into the client service team from Northern Trust’s sub-custodian network management team.

13NOV07: There is growing evidence that the Chinese authorities are managing the process of awarding mandates very carefully, ensuring that no one bank wins too much business. Just a week after BBH announced a third fund administration mandate from Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, BNY Mellon has been appointed by ICBC as overseas custodian for its Qualified Domestic Institutional Investor (QDII) fund in China. The mandate was won in partnership with BNY Mellon Asset Management, which has been appointed to provide sub-advisory services in relation to China Southern's QDII fund mandated by China Southern Fund Management Co. Ltd. China Southern's QDII fund launched at a capped USD4bn in assets, having received USD6.5bn in subscriptions from Chinese investors.

13NOV07: Northern Trust has hired Anthony Stevens for its investment risk and analytical services (IRAS) group as head of client service for asset managers in EMEA. Stevens joins from Rimes Technologies, where he was a vice president in sales. Prior to this, he managed a team of relationship managers at Mellon Analytical Solutions. He has also worked for InterSec Research Corporation and Merrill Lynch Mercury Asset Management.

13NOV07: HSBC has appointed Colin Lunn as head of business development, fund services, HSBC Securities Services, Asia Pacific. Lunn will be responsible for leading the integration of the institutional and alternative fund services business development teams. He will report locally to Lilian Wong, head of alternative fund services, Asia Pacific, and Jayant Rikhye, deputy global head and head of institutional fund services for Asia. On a functional basis, Lunn will report to Paul Stillabower, global head of business development, fund services, HSBC Securities Services. Lunn has been with HSBC/Bank of Bermuda for over twelve years, most recently as head of business development for alternative fund services for Asia Pacific.

13NOV07: Independent global hedge fund administrator Amicorp Fund Services has appointed Claudio Cecchini as director of funds. Cecchini joins Amicorp after 10 years with Citco Fund Services. Prior to Citco, he spent two years with Fortis Prime Fund Solutions in the Netherlands.

Amicorp Fund Services was established in Curacao in 1996 and is licensed by the Central Bank of the Netherlands Antilles. The company has offices in Curacao, Luxembourg and Singapore and currently has USD4bn under administration. Amicorp Fund Services is part of the Amicorp group which specialises in financial and fiduciary services and has more than 400 employees working from 25 offices in 22 countries.

13NOV07: Eagle Investment Systems LLC, a subsidiary of BNY Mellon, has appointed John Legrand as head of its EMEA and Asian operations. Based in London, Legrand will be responsible for all business operations for the region. He joins from Advent Software, where he was executive director of professional services.

12NOV07: Douglas ‘Digger’ Donahue has been selected as the next managing partner of Brown Brothers Harriman. He will replace Mike McConnell early next year. Donahue joined BBH in 1976 as a commercial banker in the firm's Boston office. He took over worldwide responsibility for the firm's investor services business in 1996. Donahue was named a partner of the firm in 1990, joining the steering committee in 1997.

12NOV07: RBC Dexia has been selected by Ark Fund Management Limited to provide a full range of investor services including custody, investment finance, valuations and unitholder recordkeeping for the company's entire family of hedge and mutual funds. Ark Fund Management is a new Canadian asset manager, having acquired the assets of SciVest Alternative Strategies Inc. in August 2007.

12NOV07: Industrial and Commercial Bank of China has selected Brown Brothers Harriman as overseas custodian for Bank of China’s third collective investment vehicle authorised under China's Qualified Domestic Institutional Investor scheme. The fund will focus on USD-denominated fixed income assets and Luxembourg SICAVs.

Under this arrangement, Bank of China is the investment manager, ICBC is master custodian and BBH is overseas custodian for this investment vehicle. In addition to global custody, BBH will also provide accounting and administration services, including compliance monitoring and fund execution services.

06NOV07: CIBC Mellon has been appointed by McLean & Partners Wealth Management Ltd to act as the company’s asset servicing provider for three new private global pooled funds. CIBC Mellon will provide global custody, fund accounting, unitholder recordkeeping, securities lending and foreign exchange services. McLean is an independent wealth management firm based in Calgary, with more than CAD1.2bn dollars in assets under management.

06NOV07: BNY Mellon has been awarded two administration mandates by Jessop Fund Managers Limited for new fund ranges within the Jessop Personal Pensions Unit Trust. BNY Mellon will provide transfer agency and fund accounting. Custody and trustee services will be provided through ABN AMRO Mellon.

06NOV07: JPMorgan has appointed Jane Perry as head of worldwide securities services for Australia and New Zealand. Perry joins after ten years with AXA Australia and New Zealand, most recently as its chief operations officer.

02NOV07: EuroCCP, the European central counterparty owned by DTCC, has appointed Diana Chan as chief executive officer and Trevor Spanner as chief operating officer. Chan joins from Citi, where she was managing director for market strategy in the EMEA global transaction services business. Spanner was managing director, European head of transaction and custody services for Merrill Lynch until 2006. Chan will report to Michael Bodson, executive managing director, DTCC business management, strategy and marketing, and Spanner will report to Chan. Richard Macek, who had been serving as the interim CEO for EuroCCP since it was formed, will return to the US.

EuroCCP is to provide clearing and settlement services for the new pan-European market created by Turquoise, a consortium of nine major global investment banks in Europe. This new multilateral trading facility is expected to begin operations next year. EuroCCP will use Citi as its settlement agent.

31OCT07: JPMorgan is the latest bank to announce a strengthening of its Middle East business development team. Tim Peters has joined as head of business development and relationship management for the worldwide securities services business in the Middle East and North Africa. Peters, who joined from Brown Brothers Harriman and previously worked for JPMorgan’s private bank, will be based in Dubai. JPMorgan says that it plans to make additional hires, who are expected to be based in the firm’s offices in Dubai and Riyadh.

Separately, it has emerged that Graeme McCallum, the highly-rated Middle Eastern specialist who moved to HSBC from State Street in 2003, has left the bank. Informed sources suggest that he has taken a job with BNP Paribas which may see him posted to Bahrain. BNP Paribas has not commented.

31OCT07: Euroclear SA/NV is making some senior management changes. Wim Claeys is to be promoted to executive director and will become a member of the management committee. Robert Urtheil will become managing director and head of corporate strategy and public affairs for the Euroclear group, replacing Anso Thiré, who will become head of the new global capital markets division.

Claeys is currently managing director and head of strategic programmes. In his new role, he will oversee all IT application development programmes across the group. Urtheil, who joins Euroclear from Oliver Wyman, will be a member of the Euroclear group management team reporting to Ignace Combes, deputy chief executive officer.

31OCT07: Citi has claimed that it is the first major international lending agent to complete a securities lending transaction in Israeli securities. Citi has offered securities clearing and settlement services in Israel since last year when it launched its direct custody and clearing services to clients through the TASE Clearing House. Citi is a member of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange and the TASE Clearing House.

30OCT07: Citi is beefing up its Middle East management team. Richard Street, who was co-head of securities and fund services sales in EMEA, has been appointed director, securities and fund services strategy & business development, Middle East and North Africa. He will be based in Dubai.

Additionally, Jervis Smith has been named as managing director, financial institutions group, head of international managed funds and Middle East. Smith was co-head of financial institutions in EMEA for the firm’s global transaction services business.

30OCT07: SEI has reached the USD100bn mark in alternative investment assets under administration. This brings the total amount of assets administered by SEI to over USD420bn globally.

SEI’s investment manager services division currently has over 100 alternative investment clients, representing over 600 funds of hedge funds, direct traded strategy hedge funds and private equity funds.

30OCT07: BIMCOR, the investment manager of the Bell Canada Enterprises' pension fund, has selected Eagle Investment Systems to replace its current investment accounting system. BIMCOR has approximately USD13bn under management. Eagle is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BNY Mellon.

30OCT07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has launched a fund hosting business in the UK. Investment Fund Services Limited (IFSL) has gained FSA authorisation and the first client launch is set for the first quarter of 2008. IFSL will provide the infrastructure and staffing to ensure the regulatory, administrative and oversight functions required under UCITS III are covered.

In the UK, BNP Paribas services just 30 clients, representing 1,600 funds and GBP156bn (USD312bn) of assets under administration.

25OCT07: BNY Mellon has been selected by Goldman Sachs Japan Co., Ltd and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation to serve as collateral agent for the first domestic Japanese Government Bond (JGB) tri-party repurchase agreements in Japan. This is the first time two Japan-based companies have utilised the tri-party structure to complete domestic JGB repurchase agreements.

25OCT07: Northern Trust has named Charlotte Wilson, Sue Guilliard and Rod Keiller as executive directors of its Guernsey trust company, Northern Trust Fiduciary Services (Guernsey Limited). Wilson, Guilliard and Keiller have been appointed respectively as managing director, head of private clients and head of institutional trust.

Wilson is responsible for ensuring the strategic direction and overall day-to-day management of NTFSG. She joined the company’s private client department in 2003. Prior to this, she was a manager at Rothschild Trust.

Guilliard has over 20 years’ experience in offshore trusts. Prior to joining Northern Trust in 2006, she acted as an executive director on the board of the Royal Bank of Canada’s fiduciary business, RBC Trustees (Guernsey) Limited.

Keiller joined the Guernsey operations in 2003 in a senior banking role. Prior to this, he was senior private banking manager at Royal Bank of Scotland International Limited.

24OCT07: Following the resignation of Mike Clark, head of JPMorgan’s worldwide securities services, the firm is to reorganise the business along two client segments: the securities company and clearance and agency. The securities company includes global custody, fund accounting, US and global fund services and global derivatives services. Clearance and agency includes clearance and settlement, collateral management, depositary receipts and deposit products.

The securities company will remain under Conrad Kozak’s management and clearance and agency will continue to be run by Diane Eshleman. They will both report to Heidi Miller, CEO of JPMorgan’s treasury and securities services business.

Alternative investment services and securities lending and execution products will become part of the securities company. Liz Nolan will continue to run alternative investment services and Sandie O’Connor will continue to manage securities lending and execution products.

24OCT07: Northern Trust has appointed Noah Uldall as derivatives programme manager in London, with the responsibility of coordinating and managing all derivative projects across Northern Trust’s asset servicing group. Uldall joins from JP Morgan, where he was a programme manager in technology infrastructure.

24OCT07: John Hancock Private Client Group has appointed JPMorgan to provide back office services for their 5,000 separately managed accounts, with assets of USD1.6bn. Services will include shadow accounting, account reconciliation, account maintenance, performance calculation and trading.

24OCT07: Morse, the international consulting firm, has made two senior hires to its financial services consulting team with the appointments of Grant Cooper and Neil Fraser. Cooper joins from Citi’s corporate and investment banking group where he specialised in OTC derivatives services. Based in London, Cooper will report to Paul Sutton, partner, who heads up the manufacturing practice which focuses on traditional and alternative institutional asset management. Fraser joins from Charles River Development and will be based in Morse’s Edinburgh office. He will report to Paul Miller, partner, who heads up the applications and technology practice which specialises in the investment industry.

19OCT07: Harding, Loevner Management, L.P. has appointed Citi as service provider for the investment advisor's retail separately managed accounts business. Harding Loevner's SMA business comprises approximately 4,800 retail accounts and has USD1.2bn in assets under management.

“To support the accelerating growth of our SMA business, we appointed Citi as our service provider because of its unique market experience, industry knowledge and technological capabilities,” said David Loevner, president, Harding, Loevner Management.

19OCT07: Thomas Murray, the custodian risk rating and advisory specialist, has been appointed by Halifax Regional Municipality Pension Plan to manage the provider review for global custody services, benefit payments, investment accounting, securities lending, performance measurement and compliance monitoring services. The appointment follows Thomas Murray’s recent mandate from the City of Edmonton.

18OCT07: Bill Osborn, chairman and chief executive officer of Northern Trust Corporation, will step down as chief executive officer on January 1, 2008. Osborn, who has served as chief executive officer since June 1995, will remain as chairman of the board, a position he has held since October 1995. Rick Waddell will become chief executive officer in addition to his current position as president.

18OCT07: BNY Mellon is to provide managed accounts administration and institutional back-office outsourcing support for O'Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC. O'Shaughnessy Asset Management is a quantitative money management firm headquartered in Stamford, CT, managing more than USD13bn in client assets.

“BNY Mellon's reputation in both small and large outsourcing efforts, and the quality of its service model, made this an easy decision for us,” said Chris Loveless, president of O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. “Our clients expect superior value from us, and we know BNY Mellon is a partner who will deliver on that level.”

18OCT07: State Street has been appointed to provide custody and investment administration services for the AUD3bn Non-Government Schools Superannuation Fund (NGS Super). State Street will provide custody and investment administration services including fund valuations, monthly performance reporting, compliance monitoring, annual financial statements and disclosure notes, taxation services, and regulatory and board reporting services.

16OCT07: Citi has implemented its global custody, fund accounting and fund administration solution for Fonds de Compensation de la Sécurité Sociale, the Luxembourg public pension fund. The Fonds de compensation du régime general de pension is a public institution responsible for the administration of general pension assets. The Fonds de compensation has established a SICAV under the name of Fonds de Compensation de la Sécurité Sociale, SICAV-FIS.

16OCT07: CIBC Mellon has been appointed by Torstar Corporation to act as trustee and asset servicing provider for the company’s pension and master trust.

“Torstar Corporation is a broad-based media company and its businesses include the Star Media Group, led by the Toronto Star. It was important for us to identify a partner that matches our reach and resources,” said Todd Smith, treasurer of Torstar. “CIBC Mellon’s commitment to client service excellence, backed by superior technology and expertise, made them the appropriate choice as our asset service provider.”

15OCT07: ABN AMRO Mellon has been appointed by Stichting Bedrijfstakpensioenfonds voor de Meubelindustrie en Meubileringsbedrijven (Bpf Meubel) to provide global custody and related services for assets valued at EUR1.5bn. Bpf Meubel is the primary pension scheme in the Netherlands for employees in the furniture and furnishing industry.

The mandate covers global custody, investment accounting, Dutch regulatory reporting, online information delivery, performance measurement, attribution, analytics, compliance monitoring and securities lending.

15OCT07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has promoted Sophie Gautié to head of strategy, development and public affairs. She reports to Florence Bonnevay, CFO and member of the executive committee. Gautié joined BNP Paribas in 2001.

10OCT07: Société Générale has become one of the first trustees for the new French real estate mutual funds (OPCI). The asset management company Euragone AM has mandated SG for the launch of its OPCIs, which are among the first to receive the approval from AMF, the French financial market authority.

OPCIs are new real estate investment vehicles for real estate professionals and individuals. Their objective is to boost the non-listed paper real estate market. SG’s services include trustee and depositary, custody, transfer agency and fund administration.

10OCT07: BNY Mellon has been appointed by Banco Popular Español, the third largest banking group in Spain, as global custodian for assets totalling USD2bn. Rafael Duarte, director and head of global financial institutions, Banco Popular Español, said: “We appointed The Bank of New York Mellon as it was able to devise and implement a service completely tailored to our needs. Its systems enable us to access global reporting across our international custody and fund of funds participations using the same reporting tool, reducing costs and streamlining our operations considerably.”

10OCT07: Thomas Murray, the custodian risk rating and advisory specialist, has been appointed by the City of Edmonton to manage the city’s search for a custodian and trustee for their endowment, defined benefit pension plans and other investment portfolios. Thomas Murray is widely expected to shake up the Canadian market following its establishment of a local presence in 2006, hiring Arti Sharma from CIBC Mellon to run the operation.

“The city requires a global custodian that will meet its changing needs and specifically provide responsive and proactive client service,” said Sandy McPherson, chief investment officer, City of Edmonton. “Thomas Murray initiated and managed the request for proposal on our behalf and the review is now in its final stages. The preferred custodian must be able to demonstrate product and service excellence against all criteria, improve operational efficiencies and maximise securities lending opportunities.”

09OCT07: American Century Investments has selected JPMorgan as sole provider for custody, fund services and securities lending for its funds and institutional accounts, representing approximately USD100bn in assets under management. JPMorgan, which has a 45pct stake in American Century, is already the primary custodian and securities lending agent, but under the new arrangement, it will be the sole provider for those services and will also provide fund accounting, financial reporting and tax services.

08OCT07: Mike Clark, the chief executive officer of JPMorgan's worldwide securities services business, is to join Fidelity Investments to head its institutional services business.

Clark, 50, will join as president of Fidelity Institutional Services, reporting to Fidelity Investments president Rodger Lawson. He will run national financial, capital markets, institutional wealth services, institutional services, all brokerage operations and the risk and brokerage technology functions.

Clark joined JPMorgan in 1994, and was made head of institutional trust services in 2000. In 2005 he was also appointed as head of JPMorgan's investor services business. JPMorgan is not expected to name a direct successor immediately, but will have the four business head reporting to Heidi Miller, head of treasury and securities services.

08OCT07: BNP Paribas Securities Services is to open an office in Singapore. Marcel Weicker will be head of the Singapore office, reporting to Jean-Marc Pasquet, head of Asia Pacific. Weicker joins from RBC Dexia.

08OCT07: Northern Trust has been selected to provide global custody and related services, including foreign exchange, cash management and brokerage, for Equinox Partners, LP, a global long/short equity fund manager with approximately USD1.3bn in assets under management.

Under the agreement, the fully paid-for assets of Equinox Partners are held in a global custody account, while assets for alternative investment strategies are maintained at prime brokers, including Northern Trust Securities, Inc. Through a solution provided by Northern Trust’s global fund services unit, Equinox receives a single report which includes performance figures and other metrics for assets held at Northern Trust and in sub-custody accounts at the prime brokers.

“Historically, we have relied on prime brokers to custody our fully paid-for securities,” said Brian Tsai, chief operating officer for Equinox. “By appointing Northern Trust as our global custodian, we’ve been able to transfer our un-levered assets into a more appropriate account, thus separating custodial and prime brokerage services in a way that minimises our fund’s counterparty risk.”

08OCT07: State Street has expanded its securities lending presence in Europe, appointing Stefan Corthouts as vice president of new business development for continental Europe, based in Luxembourg. Prior to this role, he was responsible for new business development of State Street’s offshore investment services product offering.

08OCT07: BNY Mellon has been appointed by San Marino International Investments Sicav, promoted by Banca di San Marino, to provide Luxembourg depository bank and global custody services.

Marco Calzi, managing director of San Marino Investment International Sicav, said: “Following a market review we selected BNY Mellon Asset Servicing, which clearly demonstrated its strong commitment in helping us in developing our ambitious business model.”

08OCT07: Delta Lloyd Group has taken a 12.7pct stake in KAS BANK, the specialist Dutch provider, whilst Fortis has sold its entire shareholding. The majority of KAS is owned by a small group of institutions, including ABP, ING, Aviva and PGGM.

08OCT07: RBC Dexia has been selected by Bridgewater Bank to provide custody and reporting services for the bank's Canada mortgage bond investment portfolio. The deal signifies an expansion of the existing relationship that RBC Dexia has with parent company, Alberta Motor Association.

08OCT07: Brown Brothers Harriman has made its Infomediary settlements messaging functionality available within Omgeo Connect. Asset managers will now have access to both BBH Infomediary’s post-trade communications platform and Omgeo’s allocation and matching infrastructure through a single window. External messaging via Infomediary includes outbound settlement notifications to custodians, accounting agents, securities lending providers and other interested parties. In addition, BBH Infomediary routes settlement status and confirmation messages back to Omgeo for inclusion within the Omgeo Connect transaction lifecycle monitoring interface.

08OCT07: JPMorgan has launched JPMorgan CustodyConnect, a private-labelling solution that enables financial institutions to continue offering custody and related services to their clients while reducing their proprietary investment in infrastructure, such as core custody platforms, global sub-custodian networks and applications. Swedbank, the Swedish financial institution, is the first bank to use JPMorgan CustodyConnect.

08OCT07: RBC Dexia has been selected by IA Clarington Investments Inc. to provide custody for an investment portfolio of approximately CAD5bn. IA Clarington is a subsidiary of Industrial Alliance Insurance and Financial Services Inc.

28SEP07: BNY Mellon has been selected by PCA Asset China Dragon A Share Fund - Korea's first locally domiciled fund that invests in China A-share market - to provide custody services. PCA Investment Trust Management Company, an affiliate of Prudential Asset Management and Kookmin Bank, trustee of the fund, is Korea's first locally domiciled investment trust fund to invest directly into the China A-share market.

Mr Sang-Bum Lee, head of the foreign custody team at Kookmin Bank, said: “Kookmin Bank selected The Bank of New York Mellon because of its strong partnership approach and its ability to share their expert knowledge in the complex workflow of securities and cash instruction movements to and from the China market. Over the course of many years working with The Bank of New York Mellon, they have consistently demonstrated that they can commit their valuable resources and time to meet our requirements and expectations as well as the demands of the Korean market.”

28SEP07: Washington State Investment Board has hired JPMorgan to provide custody and securities services for assets worth more than USD82bn. WSIB manages investments for 16 separate retirement funds for public employees, teachers, school employees, law enforcement officers, fire-fighters and judges. It also manages investments for 21 other public funds. State Street is believed to be the outgoing custodian.

JPMorgan’s services will include global custody, fund accounting, compliance measurement, securities lending, foreign exchange and performance measurement. WSIB will have a dedicated client service team with on-site client service in Olympia, WA.

“We hired JPMorgan for custody and securities services because they offer all the core services we need including daily accounting, compliance and performance reporting. They have the right technology and people to provide the best service for our funds,” said Theresa Whitmarsh, WSIB COO.

27SEP07: BNY Mellon has been appointed to provide back office services for Huber Capital Management LLC, a Los Angeles-based investment management firm. Services will include transaction processing, portfolio accounting, reconciliations, performance measurement, client reporting and client billing.

27SEP07: ABN AMRO Mellon has extended its relationship with Interpolis Pensions Asset Management, an entity of Achmea, taking on fund accounting responsibilities for Interpolis’ new global high yield pool vehicle, valued at EUR220m. The pool has been set up as a Fonds voor Gemene Rekening (fund for joint account), a tax-transparent asset pooling vehicle. Interpolis retains responsibility for pool participants’ administration and daily NAV calculations.

26SEP07: State Street has appointed Christopher Perretta as executive vice president and chief information officer, with responsibility for the firm’s information technology businesses globally. Perretta will report to vice chairman Joe Antonellis, who has held the CIO position since 2002.

Perretta will be responsible for the strategic direction and management of State Street’s information technology, which includes more than 5,300 employees and contractors worldwide. He will oversee global technology infrastructure, application development and systems architecture. He joins from General Electric Commercial Finance, where he was a senior vice president and chief information officer.

25SEP07: BNP Paribas has agreed to acquire the third-party depo bank business for funds of hedge funds from the Italian bank RasBank, a wholly owned subsidiary of RAS Group S.p.A., part of the Allianz Group. Upon completion of the transaction, BNP Paribas will increase its FoHF assets under administration in Italy to EUR9.8bn.

BNP Paribas will offer positions to all 11 staff within the RasBank third party FoHF office. The business has 11 staff and covers 57 funds.

BNP Paribas’ alternative fund servicing business administers more than 330 FoHFs with a total asset value of EUR27bn. Allianz recently struck a deal with Xchanging in Germany to sell a 51pct share in its Depotbank.

24SEP07: CACEIS has established a specialised team to provide customised servicing for private equity products. The service offer encompasses legal advice, accounting and valuation, risk management, compliance and custody. The team, based in Luxembourg, will use the recently acquired eFront platform, which supports the administration of non-liquid assets and the production of customised reporting.

21SEP07: BNP Paribas has launched ClearSuite, a new broker-dealer service. The product package combines clearing, settlement and custody services with a full range of outsourcing capabilities for the financial intermediaries market.

ClearSuite can process trades of all asset classes in over 90 markets worldwide. The platform includes connectivity for trade processing on MiFID-compliant multilateral trading facilities and supports an open architecture to accommodate the integration of other market trading platforms.

20SEP07: State Street has been appointed to provide a range of investment services for the Abu Dhabi Investment Company, a government-owned investment company based in the United Arab Emirates. State Street will provide custody, administration and transfer agency services from its operations in Ireland for ADIC’s newly launched offshore funds.

20SEP07: Further evidence of real momentum behind JPMorgan’s hedge fund servicing business: Financial Risk Management has appointed the firm to provide fund administration and custody services for its funds of hedge funds. JPMorgan will provide fund accounting, financial reporting, transfer agency, partnership allocations and custody services to over $10bn of assets in portfolios managed by FRM. FRM, which was founded in 1991, is a global fund of hedge funds group managing USD13bn. FRM has over 200 employees in offices in London, New York, Tokyo, Sydney and Guernsey.

Brian Robinson, group CEO of FRM, said: “The appointment of JPMorgan reflects our desire to consolidate our fund services business with a leading industry provider that can serve our investors on a global basis.”

20SEP07: State Street has reorganised its global performance and analytics services to bring them all under a single management structure. State Street’s investment analytics team will report to senior vice president Bill Pryor, who joined earlier this year from Mellon. The new unit brings together State Street Analytics, WM Performance Services, the universe and research services of Intersec, the trade cost analysis of Elkins McSherry and the alternative investment performance and analytics products of Private Edge.

19SEP07: Schroders has appointed HSBC Securities Services to administer eight investment trusts with total assets under management of GBP1.4bn.

Noel Fessey, Schroders' head of European fund services, said: “We were looking for someone to take over our investment trust fund administration service, which we had always run in-house. HSBC was one of several proposals that we considered. We chose HSS because its all-round combination of fund service experience, investment trust expertise, integrated technology, flexibility and strong client service best suited our needs.”

18SEP07: State Street has been appointed to provide investment services to Lucida plc. Lucida, a new UK insurance company, plans to accept transfers of defined benefit pension liabilities from companies as well as accept transfers of annuity portfolios from UK insurance companies.

The mandate covers Lucida’s global custody, investment accounting, performance measurement, securities lending, transition management and compliance monitoring requirements. Last year State Street won a similar mandate from bulk annuities specialist Paternoster.

18SEP07: Northern Trust claims to have become the first custodian to be able to secure reduced withholding tax rates for investors holding Italian equities through a tax-transparent, cross-border pooling vehicle. The reductions are in respect of dividend income arising from investing in Italian stocks. This could potentially increase total return for investors in Italian equities via such vehicles by over 40bp a year. The positive ruling was achieved for one client’s Irish common contractual fund which invests in Italian stocks, and is only binding on that specific fund.

14SEP07: JPMorgan has been awarded mandates in the UK for custody and related services by DSG Pension Trustees Limited and George Wimpey (now Taylor Wimpey) for their pension plans. JPMorgan will provide the DSG Retirement and Employee Security Scheme with global custody and passive currency overlay services, and global custody for the George Wimpey pension plan.

12SEP07: Société Générale Securities Services has appointed Ramy Bourgi to the newly created position of head of emerging markets development, SGSS. Based in London, Bourgi will report to Alain Closier, global head of SGSS, and Bruno Prigent, head of investor services.

Bourgi is best remembered for his 13-year spell at JPMorgan Chase, rising to become head of investor services in EMEA in 2001, a post he held until leaving last year. He joined Cambridge Place Investment Management in 2006 as co-head of business development, institutions, EMEA.

12SEP07: Michael Shipton is to become managing director and head of corporate technology for the Euroclear Group. Shipton, who joins Euroclear from Swisscom, will become a member of the Euroclear Group management team. Michael Pilkington, who is currently head of corporate technology at Euroclear, has decided to take a career break at the end of 2007 to pursue personal interests.

07SEP07: Mellon Transition Management Services, a unit of The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation, has promoted Christine Carr Smith to president and chief operating officer. Smith, who had been managing director, will continue to report to Mark Keleher, chief executive officer of MTMS. Smith joined Mellon in 1996 as compliance officer for Mellon Capital Management, an investment management subsidiary, and became a founding member of the senior management team for MTMS in 2000.

07SEP07: Fulcrum Limited, a hedge fund administrator, has hired Fred Jacobs as managing director, business development in the US. He will report to Glenn Henderson, the global head of sales. Jacobs joins Fulcrum from PFPC Global Fund Services, where he was senior vice president for global fund business development.

06SEP07: State Street has appointed Stephen Smit as president, State Street Trust Company Canada, and head of investment servicing and investment research and trading in Canada. Smit will assume responsibility for State Street’s investor services and global markets businesses in Canada. Smit was managing director of State Street Global Markets in Canada from 1995 to 2000. Smit joined State Street in 1987 and was most recently head of State Street Associates, the company’s research partnership with academia and industry experts.

Smit will lead the Canadian management team of John Folk and Ron Robertson, managing directors of investor services in Canada; Kevin Drynan, head of sales and relationship management; Don D’Eramo, head of securities finance; and John Walks, head of global markets.

06SEP07: BNY Mellon has been appointed by Banca Popolare di Milano to provide custody services.

29AUG07: Northern Trust has appointed Allan Watson as head of derivatives operations for Europe, Middle East and Africa. Watson is responsible for managing the teams that administer over-the-counter and exchange-traded derivatives, and provide collateral management services, for clients that outsource these activities to Northern Trust. He is based in London and reports to Stephen Andress, global head of derivatives operations. Watson joins from Bank of America where he was manager in the exotic rates middle office. Prior to this, he worked for Goldman Sachs in London and New York.

29AUG07: RBC Dexia has been selected by Titan Funds Incorporated to provide custody, fund valuation and investor recordkeeping for the company's new proprietary mutual fund family, which was launched in July. “Our decision to work with RBC Dexia was based on their strong corporate reputation as well as their successful track record of supporting the launches and subsequent growth of start-up funds," said Kam Kwong, president, Titan Funds Incorporated.

28AUG07: Allianz Global Investors Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH and Xchanging, the outsourcing specialist, have signed contracts to establish a partnership to provide retail investment account management services. Subject to regulatory clearance, Xchanging will hold a 51pct share in the Hof-based Fondsdepot Bank GmbH and will take over the operational control of this unit from 1 November 2007 at the latest.

Xchanging will make a cash payment of EUR13m and has granted a put option to Allianz Global Investors for the remaining 49pct for EUR13m exercisable after four years. At 31 December 2006 the net assets of Fondsdepot Bank were EUR26m and the gross assets were EUR38m. Fondsdepot Bank is regulated by the Bundesbank and BaFin, has a partial banking licence and employs more than 400 people.

Fondsdepot Bank provides retail portfolio management and administration services on an open platform to investment companies, distribution companies, banks and other businesses. With 1.3 million active securities accounts and an asset volume under management of EUR19.2bn, Fondsdepot Bank services a portfolio of 6,500 public funds of more than 150 investment companies.

28AUG07: BNY Mellon has been appointed by EBS Building Society, Ireland’s largest building society,  to provide custody services for its global portfolio valued at USD4.2bn.

28AUG07: Paladyne Systems, Inc., a provider of alternative investment systems, today has set up a client services operations centre in Fort Lee, New Jersey. The 5,000 square foot space will house approximately 50 staff focused predominantly on client help desk, technical services and operational support. Paladyne, which was established in New York in 2005, now has offices in New York City, New Jersey, London, and Russia.

17AUG07: Spa ETF Europe, a provider of exchange traded funds, has appointed BNY Mellon to provide European custody and administration services. BNY Mellon will provide full sub-advisory services, including global custody, trustee, fund accounting and fund administration. In addition, Spa ETF has appointed BNY Mellon Asset Management as sub-advisor for its new family of ETFs, to be launched in the UK in September.

17AUG07: BNY Mellon has expanded its operations in India with the opening of a second office in Pune. Mellon India Private Limited, a subsidiary of BNY Mellon, was established as a ‘captive’ operations centre in December 2004. Mellon India now employs over 620 permanent staff. The bank expects its Pune operations to expand to employ more than 1,300 staff over the next three years.

15AUG07: Richard Hale has resigned from HSBC Securities Services in London. Hale, who joined HSBC from Bisys in 2003 to run European sales, is understood to have accepted a European sales position with JPMorgan’s securities services business in London.

15AUG07: State Street has appointed Nick Wright to senior vice president and chief operating officer of State Street’s investment servicing business in the United Kingdom, Middle East and Africa (UKMEA). Wright will be responsible for managing operations and infrastructure for State Street’s investor services business for the UKMEA region. He joins State Street from Investors Financial Services Corp., which was acquired by State Street in July. Wright, who will be based in London, will report to Michael Walsh, senior vice president and managing director of State Street’s investment servicing business for the UKMEA.

At Investors Trust Europe, Wright served as managing director and head of the company’s UK office, with responsibility for all aspects of the business including operational infrastructure and business growth. He was also a member of the company’s senior management team. Prior to joining Investors Trust Europe in 2005, Wright was senior vice president at Northern Trust in London and Dublin with responsibility for the company’s investment operations outsourcing business in Europe. Prior to this role he held management positions for AXA Investment Managers and National Mutual.

15AUG07: BNY Mellon has appointed Dominick Falco as managing director and head of broker-dealer services in Asia. Falco, who will be based in Hong Kong, will be responsible for managing the company’s broker-dealer servicing business in the Asia-Pacific region, including collateral and trust services, global collateral management, derivatives margin management and international clearance products. He will report locally to Andrew Gordon, executive vice president and head of client management for North Asia, and globally to James Malgieri, executive vice president of collateral management. Falco previously worked for Citigroup/Nikko in Tokyo as a regional head of equity finance, where he was responsible for securities lending and prime brokerage in Asia.

15AUG07: Northern Trust has doubled assets under custody in cross-border pooling vehicles in the last year to USD24bn. Northern Trust is a market leader in cross-border pooling and was the first to fully support tax-transparent funds, created to pool the assets of investors with multiple tax rates. Northern Trust has a patent pending with the US Patent and Trademark Office and World Intellectual Property Organisation to protect the methods and systems it has developed to support cross-border tax-transparent pooling vehicles.

15AUG07: BNY Mellon has launched a dedicated transfer agency facility in Singapore to support the bank’s clients in distributing their investment fund products in the region.

AIM Global, a division of INVESCO Asset Management Limited, is using this TA capability to market its Dublin-domiciled USD money market fund to investors in a number of countries in Asia, including Hong Kong and Singapore. Marc Doman, managing director, AIM Global, said: “Having a local TA operating platform significantly improves the attraction of our Dublin-based money market fund to Asian investors. It enables us to provide real-time fund trading and client services during the Asian day as well as ensuring same day USD redemption payments in locally held accounts.”

13AUG07: Following the completion of the Bisys acquisition, Citi has announced a new organisational structure for its alternative investment services (AIS) business, which includes both hedge fund and private equity funds, and the fund services business.

Steve Bowman, global head of hedge fund services, and Bob Wallace, global head of fund services, will continue to jointly head the AIS business, reporting to Neeraj Sahai, global head of securities and fund services.

AIS in North America will be headed by Patrick Prill, and will include the former Bisys offices in Boston, Roseland, San Francisco, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands, plus Citi's Portland, Toronto and Bermuda businesses. AIS in EMEA and Asia Pacific will be run by Ronan Daly, who is based in Dublin. Included in these two regions will be Ireland, UK, Luxembourg, Singapore and Hong Kong.  In addition, Daly will be responsible for the international private equity expansion.

The global private equity business will continue to be headed by Joe Patellaro, who will also assume responsibility for the former RK private equity business in Roseland, New Jersey. He will continue to manage his business from New York and will work in partnership with Ronan Daly on international private equity activities.

Prill, Daly and Patellaro will report jointly to Bowman and Wallace.

Bill Neville, formerly the president of the AIS business at Bisys, will remain with the firm and will help with transition. He will report to Lee Waite, head of Bisys integration, and will become a member of the full-time integration team.

Fund services in North America will be headed by Fred Naddaff, based in Columbus, Ohio, and will include the funds business in Portland and Toronto. Fund services in EMEA will be headed by Bernard Hanratty. The EMEA region now includes the former Bisys Dublin business and Citi's existing pan-European business. Naddaff and Hanratty will report to Bob Wallace. Bisys wealth solutions will be integrated with the Citi wealth solutions product.

13AUG07: HSBC Securities Services has completed the transition of J O Hambro Capital Management’s onshore OEIC range of funds, with assets of GBP670m, to its strategic custody and fund administration platform. HSBC will also be offering a full range of trustee services to the funds.

Helen Vaughan, operations director, J O Hambro Capital Management Ltd, said: “We have been reviewing our suppliers for our onshore funds for the last 12 months and HSS was chosen as it demonstrated an in-depth knowledge of our requirements which has been demonstrated by the smooth transition of business onto their strategic platform.”

13AUG07: Citi has appointed Naveed Sultan as head of global transaction services in EMEA, from October 1, 2007.  Sultan will report to Paul Galant, CEO of global transaction services and Bill Mills, CEO, Citi markets & banking in EMEA. He is currently head of cash management in EMEA. He replaces Francesco Vanni d’Archirafi, who has been appointed as global head of cash management.

10AUG07: TCW was always going to be a key test for BNY Mellon. TCW, the Californian asset management group that has about USD160bn AUM, is a subsidiary of Société Générale Asset Management, and has been a Mellon outsourcing client since 2001, converting to Mellon’s Eagle platform in 2005.

Much to the bank’s relief, TCW has signed a five-year extension to its outsourcing agreement. BNY Mellon will continue to support all of TCW’s back and middle office investment operations, including trade processing, bank loan processing, investment accounting, partnership accounting, performance, attribution, analytics, financial statements, client billing and client statements.

“We look forward to continuing our partnership with BNY Mellon Asset Servicing,” said TCW president William Sonneborn. “Their commitment to ever-improving technology and services goes a long way toward helping TCW accomplish its business objectives.”

10AUG07: It seems that State Street was not entirely satisfied with the private equity servicing capabilities it acquired as part of last month’s purchase of Investors Financial. State Street has now bought Palmeri Fund Administrators (PFA), a specialist provider that has been in business for 16 years.

Frank Palmeri, former chief executive officer of PFA, will lead the firm’s private equity servicing initiative, under the direction of Jack Klinck, executive vice president and head of global investment product services for State Street. The deal means that State Street now services approximately USD80bn in private equity assets for nearly 100 fund sponsors managing more than 400 primary funds globally.

State Street will continue to provide private equity performance and analytics services through Private Edge, which it has offered for more than a decade. Private Edge provides detailed analyses of clients’ private equity portfolios through a fully automated web-enabled environment.

10AUG07: Citi has been appointed by Mirae Asset Investment Management Co. Ltd to provide custody, funds administration and transfer agency for its Luxembourg UCITS III SICAV fund which includes nine sub-funds investing in Asian equities. As of July 2007, Mirae Asset had approximately USD50bn AUM. Mirae Asset, an affiliate of Mirae Asset Group of Seoul, Republic of Korea, is the largest investment management company in the Korean equity fund market, with a market share of approximately 30pct, and a major player in the Asian markets.

Edward Oh, head of international business division at Mirae Asset said, “The combination of Citi’s unrivalled global network and robust local capabilities in Luxembourg made them the ideal partner to service our fund which covers multiple geographies and investment jurisdictions.”

10AUG07: China Government Securities Depository Trust & Clearing Co. Ltd (CDC), the Chinese central securities depository, is opening a link with Clearstream, the international central securities depository within the Deutsche Börse Group. By the end of August 2007, qualified members of CDC will be able to settle and safekeep international securities via CDC’s account with Clearstream.

CDC was established in 1996 to provide custody, settlement and information services for government securities, policy financial bond, corporate bonds and asset-backed securities, money market instruments and over-the-counter transactions. A state-owned non-bank financial institution authorised by Ministry of Finance and the People's Bank of China, CDC is responsible for government bond custody, bond registration, and settlement in the interbank bond market.

08AUG07: Following the recent promotion of Dirk Jones as head of sales for Citi’s securities and fund services business in EMEA, there has been a reorganisation of his team:

Patric Foley Brickley will be the senior sales strategist for EMEA and will be involved in selling the most complex and high-value transactions.

Richard Street will be moving to the Middle East from September and will be responsible for business development efforts across the region.

Sikko Vankatwijk will lead outsourcing sales across EMEA and will also run sales in Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, Nordics, Central/Eastern Europe and Africa.

Marco Siero will lead sales in the UK, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Italy, Greece, Iberia, Ireland, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

07AUG07: Northern Trust has appointed Gregg Behrens as head of Asia Pacific for its corporate and institutional services business unit. Behrens, who will move to Singapore from Chicago, will be responsible for all of Northern Trust’s businesses and operations in the Asia Pacific region, including Australia, Bangalore, China, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, and Singapore. He will report to Tim Theriault, president of corporate and institutional services. Behrens has been with the bank for over 33 years. Most recently, he was head of Europe, Middle East and Africa asset servicing.

07AUG07: Euroclear Bank and LCH.Clearnet have launched a service for LCH.Clearnet members to pledge securities through Euroclear Bank’s triparty collateral management service to cover their margin obligations with LCH.Clearnet. LCH.Clearnet will continue to manage margin requirements for its members, with Euroclear Bank serving as an independent agent to optimise the use of collateral for mutual clients. The service provides exposure matching, collateral allocation and mark-to-market valuations, margin calls and securities substitutions. The service covers transactions for which LCH.Clearnet acts as central counterparty in equity and commodity derivatives, fixed income and swaps.

03AUG07: Korea is repeatedly mentioned by global custodians as one of their key target markets in Asia, so they will be heartened by the latest news from the country’s National Pension Service. NPS, which manages over USD200bn, has appointed BNY Mellon and State Street as global custodians.

Both banks have released little information about the precise nature and value of the mandates. BNY Mellon will provide global custody, securities lending and other services for fixed income securities, whilst State Street will provide global custody, fund accounting, securities lending, compliance, and performance and analytics services.

National Pension Service, currently the largest Asian public pension fund outside Japan and the fourth largest pension fund in the world, was established in 1988 under the National Pension Act and had KRW207trn (approximately USD224bn) assets under management as at June 2007. This is projected to grow to approximately KRW415trn (USD449bn) by 2012. National Pension Service will expand its investments in bonds and stocks overseas to up to 20 percent of its total assets by 2012.

03AUG07: Citi has completed its previously announced acquisition of the BISYS Group, Inc. for approximately USD1.44bn in an all-cash transaction. Simultaneously, Citi completed its sale of the retirement and insurance services divisions of BISYS to affiliates of J.C. Flowers & Co. LLC, making the net cost of the transaction to Citi approximately USD800m.

02AUG07: JPMorgan has been appointed to provide custody and investment accounting for the GBP400m ICI Specialty Chemicals Pension Fund. JPMorgan is the custodian for the GBP7bn ICI Pension Fund, which provides pensions for ICI employees who work for a different part of the company. The Bank of New York is the outgoing custodian.

02AUG07: ABN AMRO Mellon has been appointed as global custodian for assets valued at EUR1bn by Bedrijfspensioenfonds voor de Koopvaardij (Merchant Navy Pension Fund). Hylke Hylkema, chairman of the pension fund, said: “We are pleased with the broad range of service capabilities offered by ABN AMRO Mellon and its flexibility in developing a service model tailored to our requirements, as well as by the scope and scale of the new Bank of New York Mellon organisation.”

01AUG07: The Bank of New York Mellon has been appointed by MGM Assurance to provide a derivatives margin management solution for posting and receiving collateral for OTC derivatives trades. MGM Assurance, the UK's oldest registered company, is a mutual insurance company and manages assets in excess of GBP1.6bn.

As part of the appointment, BNY Mellon will monitor performance under MGM Assurance's ISDA Credit Support Annex — the legal document widely used to govern OTC derivatives trades — including calculating derivatives exposure, receiving and delivering of collateral, and reinvesting cash collateral.

Nigel Sherry, chief operating officer at MGM Assurance, said, “Derivatives have become increasingly important as a risk management tool for our insurance and pensions-related products. We were therefore keen to identify a provider who had expertise in monitoring complex derivative transactions and proven systems for comprehensive, speedy settlement. We are very pleased to be working with the team at The Bank of New York Mellon, who are acknowledged experts in this growing field.”

01AUG07: JPMorgan Hedge Fund Services has appointed Andrew Mascall-Robson to lead business development in Asia, with Shirley Yuen joining as regional product and client service manager.

Both join JPMorgan from Fortis Prime Fund Solutions. Mascall-Robson was most recently managing director of Fortis Prime Fund Solutions in Japan. Prior to this, he was an executive director at WestLB Panmure. He has spent 17 years in Asia and has extensive experience in Japan. Yuen was most recently head of account management for Fortis Prime Fund Solutions in Asia, where she had overall responsibility for the company’s client relationships. She previously worked for KPMG and the HKSAR Government Land Fund Trust as an auditor.

31JUL07: Further evidence of the consolidation of the hedge fund administration industry. CACEIS, the French institutional securities services provider, has signed an agreement to acquire Olympia Capital International, which specialises in alternative investments. Completion of the transaction, for which financial terms were not disclosed, is expected in the fourth quarter, subject to standard regulatory approvals and closing conditions.

Founded in 1990, privately-held Olympia Capital International administers approximately USD69bn in assets for funds domiciled in Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, the British Virgin Islands, Ireland and the United States. Olympia has 230 staff, and CACEIS intends to retain the senior management team.

CACEIS already services alternative funds through Luxembourg and Ireland. The acquisition of Olympia will expand geographic coverage to include North American time zones. It follows the group’s recent acquisition in Switzerland (FidFund) and its agreement to acquire the custody activities of HypoVereinsbank in Germany.

31JUL07: HSBC has topped the 2007 R&M Fund Accounting and Administration Survey, which tracks the performance of banks servicing the GBP3trn UK retail and institutional investment management market. This is the third consecutive year that HSBC has come first in the survey. Mellon climbed two places to second, while State Street dropped to last. BNP Paribas failed to secure enough responses to qualify for inclusion, and their absence was subsequently filled by Northern Trust’s first appearance in the results.

The average score was 0.13 points higher than last year’s results. This figure was particularly helped by Mellon’s huge increase, which has moved them 0.21 points above their merger partners, The Bank of New York. Although the merger has now been completed, they were still separate companies at the time of the survey and were given individual results.

The survey concentrates on the provision of fund accounting and administration services to the UK investment management market. These services may be offered from onshore or offshore locations such as Dublin, Luxembourg and the Channel Islands. Nearly all respondents receive a daily accounting and valuation package from their suppliers.

31JUL07: David Bilbé, who left Thomson Financial earlier this year, has been appointed as managing director, Northern Europe, for Linedata Services, the asset management software specialist. Bilbé was previously at Chemical, State Street and Brown Brothers Harriman.

31JUL07: Shareholders in BISYS have voted to approve the previously announced acquisition of BISYS by Citi. Over 99pct of the shareholders present or represented at the special meeting voted for the adoption of the merger agreement. The merger, which is subject to customary closing conditions, is currently expected to occur on August 1, 2007.

30JUL07: RBC Dexia Investor Services has been selected by First State Investments to provide global custody, fund administration and transfer agency for the First State European Diversified Infrastructure Fund FCP-SIF, which provides institutional investors with exposure to European and UK-based infrastructure assets.

“Our decision to work with RBC Dexia was based on a number of factors, including their proven reputation for providing high quality client service and their strategic, consultative approach during the fund development phase,” said Greg Cooper, chief operating officer, First State Investments.

30JUL07: BNY Global Transition Management, a member of BNY ConvergEx Group, has completed a transition management mandate for the London Borough of Ealing pension scheme for assets totalling GBP550m. Ealing replaced two balanced mandates with three specialist mandates for both equity and fixed income following a review of all managers.

Nigel Watson, head of strategic finance, London Borough of Ealing, said: “We appointed BNY Global Transition Management because of its experience and track record in managing multi-asset class transitions. These processes can be very time-consuming and complex and we felt the transition went smoothly and was successfully completed to our satisfaction.”

30JUL07: State Street has expanded its relationship with Trilogy Global Advisors, LLC to include investment services for Trilogy’s newly launched institutional international funds. State Street will provide custody, fund administration, transfer agency and trustee services from its operations in Ireland.

“State Street has a strong track record with us, having serviced our group trust and limited partnership funds in Boston for a number of years,” said John Myklusch, chief financial officer of Trilogy. “As our business continues to grow and evolve, State Street has been able to offer the flexibility and global scale to support this growth with solutions that fit our business model. Expanding our relationship is a natural extension of our successful partnership.”

30JUL07: RBC Dexia Investor Services has been selected as custodian and securities lending provider for the Université du Québec's CAD2.3bn pension fund. “After an extensive assessment of the capabilities of the various investor services providers in the Québec marketplace, we determined that RBC Dexia would provide the best overall fit for our organization,” said Richard Laflamme, general director of the Université du Québec's pension fund.

30JUL07: JPMorgan has launched a new campaign to expand relationships with mid-sized companies. The firm says it is looking to significantly increase the number of clients in the middle market, which have up to USD1bn in assets. The new JPMorgan middle market team has already signed three new clients and is targeting more than 500 US companies and institutions, including not-for-profits such as hospitals and endowments and foundations, as well as corporate pension and treasury plans, public pension plans, banks, insurance companies and investment managers. The team has representatives in Chicago, Columbus, Dallas, New York, New Orleans and San Francisco.

The three new clients are:

American Bureau of Shipping of Houston (USD440m in assets), which will receive trustee, custody, accounting, performance measurement, compliance monitoring services and liquidity products.

Burke Rehabilitation Hospital of Mamoroneck, NY (USD40m in assets), taking custody, accounting, performance measurement, trustee services and liquidity products.

Cognex Corporation of Natick, MA (USD200m in assets), which will receive custody, corporate accounting, performance measurement, and liquidity products.

30JUL07: RBC Dexia Investor Services has been selected by Treasury Group Limited to provide global custody, fund administration and shareholder services for that company’s recently launched TG Treasury Asia Fund, domiciled in Dublin. This is an expansion of the existing working relationship between RBC Dexia and Treasury Group in Australia.

“We have enjoyed an extremely positive and longstanding working relationship with RBC Dexia and we are confident in our selection of their company to provide these investor services in support of our new TG Treasury Asia Fund,” said Christine Feldmanis, managing director, Treasury Group Investment Services. “We were particularly impressed with RBC Dexia’s increased geographical scope and expanded suite of services following their joint venture in 2006. We feel they are a strong partner who is well-positioned to support our business needs in multiple jurisdictions.”

Treasury Group invests in and supports the management of small to medium-sized asset management companies. Total funds under management are over AUD14bn.

30JUL07: ABN AMRO Mellon has launched a Kapitalanlagegesellschaft (KAG) lending product in Germany.

19JUL07: BNY Mellon has announced its first mandate. Logan Circle Partners, a Philadelphia-based investment group that focuses on fixed income strategies for institutional investors, has appointed the firm to administer its back office, including trade processing, bank loan processing, investment accounting, reconciliations and performance measurement. BNY Mellon also will provide client statements and billing to clients of Logan Circle, which formed earlier this year.

“The merger of The Bank of New York and Mellon Financial has created an asset servicing group with the breadth, technology and top-notch client service that we require to support our own rapidly growing business,” said Michael Bishof, chief operating officer and chief financial officer of Logan Circle Partners.

19JUL07: Northern Trust has reported strong second-quarter results, with net income rising by 23pct to USD206.9m. Assets under custody stand at USD4trn, up 26pct.

18JUL07: State Street has turned in an impressive second-quarter performance, with record revenue of USD1.921bn. Assets under custody rose by 20pct to USD13.04bn. The bank says that Investors Financial also had strong results in the second quarter, although these are not reflected in State Street’s figures.

18JUL07: RBC Dexia Investor Services has launched its global unit registry system in Australia. The proprietary system provides fund managers with a complete retail and wholesale unit registry (transfer agency) outsourcing solution. Last September RBC Dexia struck a fund administration and unit registry deal with Goldman Sachs JBWere Asset Management, which involved the established of a new transfer agency operation in Melbourne and a lift-out of GSJBW staff.

18JUL07: JPMorgan’s trustee and fiduciary business has passed the milestone of USD1trn in assets under trusteeship. The business, which earlier this year celebrated its twentieth anniversary, acts in a fiduciary capacity for European collective investment schemes and operates in Dublin, Frankfurt, Jersey, Luxembourg and the UK. In 1997 Chase provided services to 554 funds with a value of USD72bn; today that has increased to 1,502 funds with a value of more than USD1trn.

18JUL07: KBC Group has appointed Société Générale Securities Services as agent bank by for all its Spanish assets. Previously with Exel Bank, which has recently been acquired by BNP Paribas, the mandate covers KBC Bank and KBC Securities assets, which amount to more than EUR2bn.

18JUL07: BNP Paribas and Natixis have signed a memorandum of agreement for the acquisition of a minority stake of 33.4pct in the capital of SLIB by BNP Paribas. Finalisation of the agreement is subject to the approval of regulatory authorities. SLIB is currently a 100pct subsidiary of Natixis. SLIB specialises in securities services and offers its clients software solutions for clearing, settlement and custody activities in France and abroad.

17JUL07: State Street has been appointed by the Workers Compensation Nominal Insurer of New South Wales (Nominal Insurer) to provide investment services for approximately AUD12bn (USD10.5bn) in assets. Nominal Insurer is responsible for managing workers compensation insurance policies and for managing the operations and investment assets of the Workers Compensation Insurance Fund (WCIF). State Street will provide custody, accounting, performance and analytics, mandate monitoring and financial reporting services for WCIF.

13JUL07: Société Générale Securities Services has announced that it has signed a purchase agreement with Pioneer Investments Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH, a subsidiary of Pioneer Global Asset Management S.p.A., to acquire its fund administration and middle and back office services in Germany. Closure of the deal is subject to the approval of regulatory authorities and is expected not later than year-end.

The operations acquired by SGSS include fund administration services for Pioneer Investments and other German fund managers, and middle-office services for Pioneer Investments, based in Munich. The related funds under administration amount to EUR55bn. This acquisition will give SGSS nearly EUR440bn of assets under administration in Europe. Around 170 employees from Pioneer Investments will join SGSS in Germany.

The announcement of this deal between SGSS and Pioneer Investments, the asset management subsidiary of the UniCredit Group, comes less than a year after SGSS completed the purchase of UniCredit’s securities services in Italy, Luxembourg and Ireland.

13JUL07: State Street has demonstrated the power of its US mutual fund franchise with another major mandate. It is to provide custody, fund accounting and fund administration services for approximately USD18bn in assets for the Baron Funds’ US mutual funds.

“At Baron, we invest for the long-term and need a provider who can support our global growth,” said Ron Baron, chairman and chief executive officer of Baron Funds. “Given State Street’s leadership in the US mutual fund business and its overall commitment to the industry, we felt it was the best provider who could support the growth of our business. State Street was a good choice for us to consolidate our services.”

13JUL07: BISYS Retirement Services, a division of The BISYS Group which is in the process of being sold to JC Flowers, has completed the acquisition of Frontier Trust Company from AXA Financial, Inc. With assets under management exceeding USD12bn, Frontier Trust has business lines consisting primarily of trustee and custodial services for qualified retirement plans. Existing employees of Frontier Trust, along with the current management team, will remain with the business and operate as a separate division within the retirement services business.

12JUL07: Citi has signed Hong Kong-based hedge fund Fair Capital to use the bank's OpenPrime technology in Asia. Founded in 2006, Fair Capital focuses on a long/short equity strategy in Hong Kong and China stocks. OpenPrime provides front and back office capabilities including trading, portfolio management and accounting. The service supports multi-strategy, multi-asset class and multi-currency investing. It is offered jointly by Citi's prime finance and global transaction services businesses.

12JUL07: Northern Trust has made two senior promotions within its investment risk and analytical services (IRAS). Jim Trotter has been named global deputy head of IRAS, focusing on integrating performance measurement, risk measurement and compliance monitoring. Simon Willcox has been promoted to lead the international IRAS product management team for EMEA.

12JUL07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has appointed Adam Hodgkins as a business development manager within the institutional investor coverage team. Based in London, he reports to Malcolm Pobjoy, head of UK coverage for institutional investor clients. And will be responsible for growing BNP Paribas’ business with major asset managers. Prior to his appointment, Hodgkins was European sales director at Perot Systems Commercial Group with responsibility for the financial services sector.

11JUL07: Northern Trust has completed a partial migration of the investment operations of Vontobel Asset Management, Inc. to its proprietary investment operations outsourcing platform. Vontobel Asset Management is the New York-based investment management subsidiary of Switzerland’s Vontobel Holding, AG.

Northern Trust will support Vontobel’s investment management business by providing post-trade execution support, trade processing and settlement, data management, reconciliation, portfolio accounting, client valuations and reporting, foreign exchange, post-trade compliance services, performance measurement and composite management.

“Northern Trust’s fully integrated solution, coupled with its well-earned reputation for quality delivery, ultimately gave us the assurance we needed to select them as our outsourcing partner,” said Henry Schlegel, president and chief executive officer of Vontobel Asset Management, Inc.

In 2005 Vontobel Asset Management struck a deal with Citi for separately managed accounts administration in the US.

11JUL07: Kate Homewood has been appointed as head of UK client service for RBC Dexia. She is currently head of sales and relationship management in Australia, and will be relocating to London in September. She takes over from Tim Wood, who has been managing the area on an interim basis since being appointed head of UK securities operations earlier this year.

Michael Bonhote joins RBC Dexia as regional head, sales and relationship management, Australia, to replace Kate Homewood.

RBC Dexia has also named Scott McLaren as head of sales and relationship management for Asia Pacific. Based in Hong Kong, he will oversee the firm’s sales and relationship management strategy for the entire region, including Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia.

11JUL07: Paladyne Systems, a provider of alternative investment solutions, is opening of a London representative office to be headed by David Simmonds, who joins from Misys Global Managed Services. As regional director, Simmonds will report to Paladyne’s New York-based president, Scott Alderson.

10JUL07: Following our story in March, Northern Trust has now confirmed that Peter Cherecwich has joined as head of institutional strategy and product development. Cherecwich, who has spent three months on gardening leave, was previously at State Street, where he was head of the global investment operations outsourcing business. Cherecwich is based in Chicago and reports to Timothy Theriault, president of corporate and institutional services.

06JUL07: Société Générale Securities Services has been appointed by London-based fund manager, Liontrust Asset Management PLC, to provide custody, fund administration, listing and paying agency, domiciliary and registrar and transfer agency services to Liontrust International Funds (Luxembourg) SICAV. The SICAV will be serviced out of SGSS's operations in Luxembourg.

06JUL07: BNY Mellon has moved quickly to resolve the issue of ABN AMRO Mellon, the joint venture company established in 2003. ABN AMRO is to sell back its 50pct share in the business, with the transaction likely to be completed in this quarter. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

06JUL07: Deutsche Bank has bought the institutional cross-border custody business of Türkiye Garanti Bankasi A.Ş. The transaction has already been completed. The acquisition covers the Turkish custody and sub-custody services provided by Garanti Bank to non-resident financial institutions, including institutional investors. These services include clearing and settlement of Turkish securities, safekeeping, asset servicing and tax services, as well as associated Turkish Lira cash and liquidity management services. Assets under custody are more than Turkish Lira 25bn (approximately EUR14bn). The transfer is expected to be completed by April 2008. Deutsche Bank launched its custody business in Turkey in 2005.

05JUL07: Richard Fodder has joined Brown Brothers Harriman as a senior vice president and head of investor services in London. Fodder will report to Andrew Tucker, BBH partner responsible for Europe. Fodder began his career at Barings and has also worked at Bankers Trust, Deutsche Bank and State Street. Before joining BBH, he was head of client management for UK asset managers for JPMorgan’s investor services business.

04JUL07: Citi has made further changes to its senior management line-up in Europe.

Dirk Jones is appointed head of EMEA sales for securities and fund services. Jones was global issuer services sales head, a role he will retain. He will report to Neeraj Sahai, global head of securities and fund services, and Francesco Vanni d’Archirafi, head of global transaction services in EMEA.

Malcolm Butler is appointed head of investor services, with the mandate to align global custody, funds services and securities finance services. Butler ran the global fixed income trading business for securities finance. He will also report to Sahai and Vanni, and will continue to report to Tim Douglas for his global fixed income responsibilities.

Clive Triance continues as chief operating officer for securities and fund services in EMEA as well as head of intermediary services.

04JUL07: Mark Westwell has left his job at The Bank of New York to join State Street in London. Westwell, who joined BNY from JPMorgan in 2005 as a fund management client executive, is reported to be taking a sales and relationship management role at State Street.

03JUL07: Citi has made two senior management appointments in its global transaction services business.

Francesco Vanni d’Archirafi has been appointed as the new head of global cash management. He was previously head of global transaction services for Europe, Middle East and Africa. He will relocate to New York from London. He has been with Citi for over 24 years, and is a member of Citi's management committee, and chairman of Citibank Europe plc.

Julie Monaco has joined Citi as head of global transaction services for North America, a new position. Monaco was previously at JPMorgan where she was a product executive in the treasury and securities services business, responsible for core treasury management services including payments, receivables and trade finance.

03JUL07: The Bank of New York Mellon has appointed Steve Langton as vice president, hedge fund product manager. Based in London and reporting to David Aldrich, managing director, Langton will develop the bank’s capabilities for servicing hedge funds managed by Europe-based managers.

Langton joins from SS&C Fund Services where he was responsible for building the fund services business and developing brand awareness in EMEA. Prior to this, he was sales director at Macgregor UK Limited, and senior account manager at Omgeo.

03JUL07: Northern Trust has been selected by the State of Tennessee to provide investment services for the Tennessee Consolidated Retirement System and two smaller public funds, the Baccalaureate Education System Trust and the Chairs of Excellence Trust. The USD29.3bn in assets have already moved to Northern Trust.

03JUL07: Robert Scott has joined Deutsche Bank as a managing director and global head of securities clearing. He will be based in London and will report to Roger Harrold, the global head of domestic custody services. In this new position Scott will bring together all the custody unit’s clearing related products and services across all the 28 markets in which it operates. His responsibilities will include product innovation, strategic planning, client service and business development with the broker-dealer community and other financial institutions. The initial focus will be on the European markets. Scott joins from Cantor Fitzgerald.

03JUL07: The merger to create The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation has been completed. BNY Mellon will have USD18trn of assets under custody and more than USD1trn of assets under management.

On the same day, State Street completed its takeover of Investors Financial, which creates a custodian with over USD14trn of assets.

02JUL07: Further evidence of the attractions of the administration business to private equity: 3i Growth Capital has taken a USD57m investment in Fulcrum Ltd, the hedge fund administrator. Akshaya Bhargava of 3i will become Fulcrum’s chief executive officer. Glenn Henderson, Fulcrum’s current CEO, will become chief sales officer.

In May, 3i took a stake in KNEIP, the Luxembourg-based fund administrator. Last September, 3i sold its majority stake in SmartStream to TA Associates, another private equity firm.

02JUL07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, which specialises in the development, production and marketing of generic and proprietary branded pharmaceuticals, to act as global custodian and investment accountant for its proprietary assets.

02JUL07: Northern Trust has announced promotions to its Guernsey-based executive team. In Guernsey, Northern Trust now has assets under administration of GBP28.5bn, assets under custody of GBP30bn and customer deposits of GBP3.9bn.

Vic Holmes has returned to Guernsey as chief executive of Northern Trust’s Channel Islands operations and managing director of Northern Trust International Fund Administration Services (Guernsey) Limited. Holmes has extensive experience in Guernsey, having worked on the island for the company between 1985 and 1990 and 2003 and 2005.

Steve Watts has been promoted to managing director of Northern Trust (Guernsey) Limited. Watts moves up from deputy managing director.

Keith Stubbington has been promoted to deputy managing director of Northern Trust (Guernsey) Limited.

Peter Dumont has been appointed as head of the world wide operations and technology (WWOT) group in Guernsey. Dumont has been with Northern since 1987.

02JUL07: JPMorgan CommanD, the firm’s derivatives collateral management solution, has added its 20th client. JPMorgan CommanD clients are in markets including Canada, Denmark, France, Ireland, Luxembourg, the UK and the US.

Clients include the World Bank, Resolution Asset Management, Standard Life Investments and JPMorgan Asset Management (UK). JPMorgan has expanded the service over the past year to include enhanced cash reinvestment options, re-hypothecation, and the provision of credit. The service is now available to banks, asset managers, pension fund managers, governments, government sponsored agencies, hedge funds and corporates. The service supports over 30 derivative instruments and handles balances of over USD29bn in derivatives collateral.

29JUN07: A new mandate for Citi in Luxembourg is an early indication that its strategy to provide integrated hedge fund services is paying off. Citi has been appointed by Nexum, a hedge fund investing in European high-yield debt instruments focusing on issuers in the Nordic region, to service its Luxembourg domiciled hedge fund. Citi will act as fund administrator, transfer agent and custodian, and provide prime brokerage services and compliance monitoring. All assets have been migrated onto Citi’s common funds administration and custody platform in Luxembourg.

Thomas Lifvendahl, managing director at Nexum, said: “Citi’s position as a leading corporate bank with investor services and prime brokerage capabilities, combined with its global network and local capabilities in Luxembourg, made them a natural partner for us. Citi responded to our need for a single provider who could offer in-house prime brokerage for a wide range of financial instruments and strategies, full automation and STP processing and consistent reporting.”

29JUN07: RBC Dexia Investor Services has been selected by Swiss Re's UK Admin Re(R) operation to provide custody and valuation services  for a GBP1.75bn portfolio of funds. “We were impressed by the scope of RBC Dexia's capabilities, as well as our experience of their flexibility and excellent client service,” said Nick Hayter, chief financial officer of Swiss Re's UK Admin Re(R) operation. “We have worked with RBC Dexia since 2004 in other areas of our business and feel that they are the best choice to provide custody and net asset valuation for this new fund.”

29JUN07: CIBC Mellon has been appointed by Excel Funds Management Inc. as custodian for the company’s family of mutual funds and the Excel India Trust. Excel Funds Management Inc. focuses exclusively on investment opportunities in emerging markets. Excel has approximately USD600m in assets under management.

29JUN07: JPMorgan has been awarded mandates for custody and related services by five UK mid-size pension funds: ArvinMeritor UK, House of Fraser, Kingston Communications, Lend Lease UK and Pilot’s National Pension Fund.

29JUN07: Northern Trust has expanded its services for OTC derivatives trading to include independent valuation of derivatives for its custody, fund administration and investment operations outsourcing clients. The automated solution links to third-party specialist providers of OTC derivatives valuations and uses a system of tolerance checks to arrive at optimum pricing and performance measurement for the complex financial instruments. In addition to independent valuation, the service includes automated collateral management for OTC derivatives trades under ISDA master agreements.

29JUN07: Euroclear has announced a further EUR27m in annualised tariff reductions at Euroclear Bank, adding to the EUR 78 million implemented earlier this year. Retroactive to 1 June 2007, the new round of tariff cuts will apply to safekeeping fees for Eurobonds and German Bunds. This is the second tariff reduction for these securities this year. The EUR11m in safekeeping fee cuts will also apply to Argentine and Greek debt securities. In addition, the latest tariff reduction will save Euroclear Bank clients about EUR16m in communication fees across all channels.

29JUN07: The Bank of New York has expanded its sub-custody network to 105 locations through the addition of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. HSBC Bank Middle East Limited in Kuwait and The Saudi British Bank in Saudi will act as BNY’s sub-custodians in these countries.

25JUN07: RBC Dexia has appointed Joanna Meager as UK managing director. Meager is responsible for overseeing strategy and growth for the company’s UK operations. She has joined from Deutsche Bank in London, where she was COO and global managing director of control. Prior to Deutsche Bank, she worked for five years with Credit Suisse Asset Management as managing director of European operations and IT.

Additionally, RBC Dexia has announced three appointments in the UK:

Stephen Donnet has joined as senior manager, client solutions in the company’s fund services group in London. He was at Citigroup, where he worked in the outsourcing business. Prior to Citigroup, he was a senior manager at Aegon Asset Management.

Rob Lowe has joined as sales support manager. He was head of operations with Beach Capital Management.

Peter Fairweather has joined as director, relationship management. Previously, he held a senior relationship management role with Mellon in the UK.

Separately, Kevin O’Neill has joined RBC Dexia as director, business development, US. Prior to joining RBC Dexia, O’Neill was with Mellon, marketing fund administration and custody services in both the UK and US.

25JUN07: Northern Trust has appointed Robert Frazer as head of global consultant relationships within the asset servicing business, based in London. Frazer comes to Northern Trust from Thomas Murray where he spent two years as senior consultant, responsible for leading client custodian searches across the pension, insurance and fund manager sectors in UK and European markets. Previously he spent 16 years with Standard Chartered Bank in its custody and corporate banking division.

22JUN07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Allianz Investmentbank AG in Austria to provide global custody services for the Allianz Group’s Austrian funds business. The bank will provide global custody services for 16 public mutual and institutional funds (Spezialfonds) managed by the Vienna-based Allianz Invest Kapitalanlagegesellschaft mbH. The portfolio contains assets of USD3.3bn covering 23 markets. Allianz Investmentbank is part of Allianz Global Investors. BNY has outsourcing relationships with Allianz in the UK and the US.

22JUN07: Stockholders in Investors Financial Services Corp. have approved the acquisition of the company by State Street. The board of governors of the Federal Reserve System has also approved the proposed acquisition.

22JUN07: Mellon has been appointed to provide transfer agency and fund accounting for three funds, under the Fitzwilliam OEIC banner, with a combined value of around GBP150m. WAY Fund Managers Limited operates as the Authorised Corporate Director to the Fitzwilliam OEIC on behalf of BDO Stoy Hayward Investment Management Ltd. Trustee and custody services to the Fitzwilliam OEIC are already provided through ABN AMRO Mellon.

21JUN07: Genesis Asset Managers has appointed Brown Brothers Harriman to service two Luxembourg SICAVs, the Genesis Emerging Markets Investment Company and Genesis Smaller Companies SICAV, together totalling approximately USD4.5bn in assets. BBH is providing global custody, accounting and transfer agency.

“BBH’s strong network management capability, experience in emerging markets, and client service model were important factors when selecting them to service these funds.” said Martyn Ryan, Genesis partner.

21JUN07: When Penny Biggs, Northern Trust’s global head of sales, relocated to Chicago from London earlier this year, it was an indication that the bank realised the relative weakness of the US sales team. Jeff Conover, who had turned around the bank’s Canadian operation, was appointed as North American institutional asset servicing sales, and now three new faces have been added to the team.

Donald DeBolt, a senior institutional sales representative, is based in Boston and will work with investment management firms in the Northeast region. He previously served as director of national sales and client development for the financial software firm GCom² Solutions.

Gwyn Koepke rejoins Northern Trust as a senior institutional sales representative based in Chicago, focusing on large corporate clients. Koepke started her career at Northern Trust as a custody product manager and trust officer in London and Chicago. She joins Northern Trust from the US Department of Treasury, where she was China Desk Officer.

Lisa Bruce, based in Chicago, is an institutional sales representative concentrating on middle-market clients. She has worked in the Chicago, London and Dublin offices on services including multinational pooling, investment services and valuation and new client transitions.

21JUN07: The Bank of New York, which has had some trouble gaining any real momentum in the Far East, is beginning to find its feet in China. Having announced a mandate from Shanghai Pudong earlier this month, it has now been appointed by China Everbright Bank as global custodian for its qualified domestic institutional investor business in China. BNY already provides China Everbright Bank with cash management and trade finance services and acts as custodian for its proprietary assets.

21JUN07: Mellon continues to focus its resources on the public and endowment sectors in the US. It has been selected by Barnard College, Dickinson College and The University of Tulsa to provide global custody, performance and analytics for their endowments funds. Combined, the endowment assets are approximately USD565m.

20JUN07: Marc Russell-Jones has returned to The Bank of New York as managing director and head of sales for alternative investment services in Europe. Based in London, he will report to David Aldrich, managing director and European business manager of the bank’s alternative investment services division. Russell-Jones spent two years at Northern Trust as vice president for alternative investment sales across Europe. Prior to this, he had been at BNY for three years where he was responsible for sales of hedge fund and exchange-traded fund services.

20JUN07: JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services has expanded its operation in Amsterdam by hiring new employees and moving to larger office space. A new team, led by John Gout, who joined from ABN AMRO Mellon, will expand the scope of the firm’s business in the Netherlands to provide custody, securities lending, accounting, investment operations, fund administrative services and alternative investment services.

20JUN07: Northern Trust has been selected to provide custody and fund administration services to the GBP45m Gottex Market Neutral Trust Limited, a Guernsey-based fund of hedge funds. Gottex Fund Management, which was founded in 1992, specialises in absolute return strategies. It has funds under management of approximately USD11bn. In October 2005 Gottex appointed The Bank of New York to provide fund-of-hedge-fund services for the USD5bn Gottex Value Added Fund, which BNY described as a ‘landmark deal’.

19JUN07: Tim Lind, who has earned himself a very high profile in the industry, has joined Omgeo, the provider of post-trade, pre-settlement services. Lind, who becomes managing director, strategic planning, will report directly to Marianne Brown, president and CEO, and joins Omgeo’s executive team.

Prior to joining Omgeo, Lind was senior vice president, product management and strategy at GoldenSource Corporation. He is probably best known for his time at TowerGroup, where he was director, securities and investments. He has also worked for SWIFT, Brown Brothers Harriman and Dean Witter Reynolds.

19JUN07: BNP Paribas has appointed Amir Hakim as head of pre-sales in the UK financial intermediaries team. He will be based in London, reporting to Jason Nabi, head of financial intermediaries UK.

19JUN07: Mellon has extended its 16-year relationship with the State of Wisconsin Investment Board to provide global custody, accounting, performance and analytics, securities lending and foreign exchange for USD89bn in trust funds for the Wisconsin Retirement System as well as an additional USD6bn in the state investment fund assets.

“Mellon Financial has provided us with top-notch service for 16 years,” said Gail Hanson, interim executive director of SWIB. “During that period, Mellon has continued to develop products, technology and customer service to meet our evolving needs.”

18JUN07: JPMorgan has taken a significant step forward in its effort to capitalise on the value of its investment bank franchise and expertise. For the first time, operations for both the investment bank (IB) and worldwide securities services (WSS) are to be managed by a shared team of executives.

Scott Sandler will become head of securities processing across both the IB and WSS, with Lawrence Waller becoming head of derivatives processing across both the IB and WSS. They will report to Frank Bisignano and Mo Osborne, and they will become members of the WSS executive committee, led by Mike Clark.

The bank also announced that Tony Best is taking on a new role as CEO of JPMorgan's global hedge fund business, reporting to Steve Black and Bill Winters, the global co-heads of the IB, and Heidi Miller, head of the treasury and securities services business. Best, who was previously European head of sales and marketing for derivatives and global head of retail structured products, will develop a more integrated approach to the hedge fund market. His areas of focus will include a more coordinated client calling effort, building a global corporate finance practice across the hedge fund market, continuing to build a hedge fund services platform across T&SS and the IB, focused on back and middle office administration and operations, and prime brokerage.

15JUN07: Mellon has been appointed to administer the middle and back office managed accounts business of Epoch Investment Partners. Services include account opening and maintenance, transaction support, custodian reconciliation and performance measurement. In addition, Mellon will provide Epoch with an imaging and workflow tool to improve its operational efficiencies.

Epoch, which began operating in 2004, manages over USD5.3bn in assets including USD55m in managed account assets. Epoch focuses on free cash flow and dividend yield as significant components of its stock selection process.

14JUN07: The Bank of New York has won three new mandates:

Goldman Sachs International has appointed BNY to provide fund services for its UCITS III Luxembourg Sicav. The bank will act as depository bank, custodian, fund accountant, transfer agent and global collateral manager.

Sarasin Chiswell, the London-based specialist investment management firm that is 75pct owned by Bank Sarasin, has selected BNY as global custodian for GBP2bn of client assets.

Casa4Funds, a management company founded in Luxembourg in 2006, has appointed BNY to provide Luxembourg depository bank and global custody services for its new UCITS III Luxembourg Sicav.

13JUN07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Shanghai Pudong Development Bank as global custodian for its qualified domestic institutional investor business in China. Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, which was incorporated in 1993 and listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange in 1999, is a nationwide joint-stock commercial bank.

Challenge Liu, general manager of custody services at SPDB, said, “The QDII investment channel represents a major opportunity for our bank, so we searched for a partner to provide the support and expertise that may help us in our efforts to grow this business. With its global leadership position in the custody industry, The Bank of New York has a highly qualified team of professionals and proven track record to serve our needs.”

11JUN07: State Street has hired Thomas Eichenberger as senior director of business development for its institutional investor sales team. Eichenberger joins from The Bank of New York and will be responsible for sales to the US corporate pension market. He will report to Jay Carty, senior vice president and head of sales for State Street's institutional investor services.

At BNY Eichenberger was a managing director overseeing a national team of relationship managers providing master trust and custody services for public and corporate funds, endowments, foundations, Taft-Hartley plans, insurance companies and banks.

07JUN07: The University of Kentucky has selected Northern Trust to provide asset servicing, including custody and investment risk and analytics, for the university’s USD746m endowment.

“Northern Trust stood out as a clear leader in the not-for-profit sector as evidenced by their extensive experience with similar clients,” said Susan Krauss, the university's assistant treasurer. “While our endowment continues to grow and diversify into the alternative investment space, Northern will help us better manage our assets. Specifically, their capabilities around performance and risk reporting will be of great value as we move forward.”

07JUN07: The Somerfield Pension Scheme has appointed State Street to provide investment servicing for GBP300m in assets. State Street will provide global custody, investment accounting, independent swaps pricing and reconciliation services. WM Performance Services will provide performance measurement services. Somerfield was advised by Mercer Investment Consulting.

05JUN07: GlobeOp Financial Services has launched its GoOTC service as a standalone outsourced package for over-the-counter derivative trade processing. The GoOTC package was previously only available as part of GlobeOp’s integrated middle- and back-office service.

GlobeOp now values 61 distinct OTC derivatives each day, processing over 1,300 OTC derivatives trades daily and, against ISDA statistics, approximately 3.8pct of the global daily OTC derivative trading volume.

05JUN07: The Bank of New York has appointed Michael Chan as managing director and chief operating officer for its Asia Pacific asset servicing business. Based in Singapore, Chan is responsible for operations, client service, account processing and other support functions. He reports to Chong Jin Leow, managing director and head of investor services Asia, who is also based in Singapore. Prior to joining BNY, Chan was with State Street in Hong Kong, where he oversaw the strategic business development of regional and global relationships in Asia Pacific.

01JUN07: One of Mellon’s enduring problems has been its exposure to the US public pension sector, where margins are notoriously low. Yet it continues to add these mandates at a time when most other firms are pursuing higher-value clients, evidenced by its latest win. It is to provide global custody, performance measurement and analytics, foreign exchange and securities lending for the City of Jacksonville's pension funds for city employees and correctional officers. The combined assets of the funds are approximately USD2.5bn.

“We have selected Mellon Financial as our custodian because of its experience in servicing public funds, its reputation for delivering award-winning client service, and its consistent commitment to investing in technology and new product development,” said Michael Givens, treasurer for the City of Jacksonville. “Mellon is providing customised systems that have the flexibility to meet our own specific needs.”

01JUN07: A mysterious management change at Northern Trust, which has announced that Terry Toth is stepping down as president of Northern Trust Global Investments. “We appreciate Terry’s many contributions to Northern Trust over the years, and we wish him well in all of his future endeavours,” said Bill Osborn, chairman and chief executive officer.

The move looks unexpected, as Northern has begun an internal and external search for a replacement. In the interim, the NTGI senior leadership team will report to Rick Waddell, president and chief operating officer.

31MAY07: The National Bank of Kazakhstan has expanded its relationship with The Bank of New York, appointing the bank to act as global custodian for an additional USD7.5bn of assets. BNY was appointed in 2004 to provide custody, accounting, performance measurement, compliance monitoring and securities lending for USD3bn of assets.

Yuri Gerasimenko, director, treasury department, National Bank of Kazakhstan, said: “Over the three years we have been working with The Bank of New York, they have demonstrated that they have the knowledge and experience to meet the complex needs of our business.”

31MAY07: Maria Hagbro has joined The Bank of New York as assistant vice president on the Nordic client management team. Based in London and reporting to Gunnel Orndahl, managing director, she will assist in the marketing of all products across the Nordic/Baltic region. She joins from Northern Trust where she was an account manager for two years, managing relationships in Sweden and providing support for the other Nordic markets.

31MAY07: The Bank of New York has been selected by Assured Guaranty Ltd. as global custodian. Assured Guaranty Ltd. is a Bermuda-based holding company whose operating subsidiaries provide credit enhancement products to the US and international public finance, structured finance and mortgage markets.

Robert Mills, chief financial officer of Assured Guaranty Ltd., said, “The bank's strong product offering and proven commitment to our specific market segment were critical factors in our decision to select them as our global custodian, and we look forward to working with their highly regarded insurance industry specialists.”

25MAY07: Shareholders of The Bank of New York and Mellon have approved the proposed merger of the two companies. The merger is on schedule for an expected closing early in the third quarter of 2007, subject to receipt of regulatory approvals.

The new company, The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation, is expected to have assets under custody and administration of more than USD18trn, and assets under trusteeship of more than USD8trn. It also will rank among the top 10 global asset managers with assets under management exceeding USD1trn.

22MAY07: Mellon has been awarded the administration mandate for ABN AMRO Bank’s new suite of UCITS III approved funds, which will be marketed under the Brushfield brand. Global custody and depositary services will be provided through Mellon’s joint venture, ABN AMRO Mellon. Fund accounting and transfer agency will be provided by Mellon’s asset servicing division. The first fund in the new Brushfield range, Defined Alpha 20, was launched in February.

22MAY07: CRESTCo, the central securities depository for UK and Ireland, is to change its name to Euroclear UK & Ireland. The change will become effective from July.

17MAY07: Compare and contrast the fortunes of The Bank of New York and Mellon, whose shareholders meet next week to debate the merits of their proposed merger. Whilst Mellon has just lost its flagship international outsourcing client, F&C, BNY is making further progress in Europe. BNY’s marketing alliance with Nordea has paid off with its appointment as global custodian by Arbejdsmarkedets Tillægspension (ATP), Denmark’s largest pension fund, for assets totalling USD73bn. BNY will also provide a range of additional services including trade support, derivatives administration and data management. ATP is a fully funded supplementary pension scheme covering almost the entire Danish population.

Bjarne Graven Larsen, CIO, ATP said: “We were impressed with the bank’s consultative approach from the outset. Not only was it able to develop an integrated technical solution to interface with our portfolio management system, it was also able to develop an operating model to support our expanding investment universe. Their commitment to support our vision of being the world's best pension fund by 2010 and strength in the Nordic region were key deciding factors during the tender process.”

Nordea will continue to service ATP’s domestic mutual funds in Denmark, and will provide local client servicing for the relationship.

16MAY07: Further evidence of the growing interest of private equity firms in the fund administration sector. 3i Growth Capital, a UK-based firm, has invested EUR37m for a minority stake in KNEIP Communication, the Luxembourg-based fund administrator. KNEIP services more than 9,000 funds and sub-funds from 16 jurisdictions. CIB Partners acted as an adviser to KNEIP.

16MAY07: Anthony Macdonald has joined Mellon Analytical Solutions from Barclays Global Investors as a client relationship manager. Macdonald will be based in Lilliane Chebaro’s client relationship management team in London, which reports to Allison Langley, head of client relationship management for Mellon Analytical Solutions. He will be responsible for managing major client relationships in the UK, Ireland and other European markets.

15MAY07: Mellon’s ill-starred relationship with F&C Management Limited has finally been ended. The pair have announced the dissolution of their UK investment administration agreement, originally signed in 2003, and are planning to transfer affected employees back to F&C’s in-house operations function.

The functions that F&C outsourced to Mellon, prior to F&C's merger with ISIS Asset Management, include: recordkeeping; trade communication; matching and settlement; reconciliation; treasury services; derivatives support including collateral management; securities lending administration; data services and information delivery.

Luc Leclercq, head of operations, IT and projects at F&C, said: “Since our merger we have run with both an outsourced operations solution on the legacy F&C business and an in-house arrangement on the former ISIS business. We have determined that our key operations priority is to migrate our investment support functions on to a single solution, so that as our business enters a new growth phase we can meet the needs of our clients in a consistent and integrated manner. Following discussions with Mellon we have therefore jointly decided to unwind the existing agreement.”

The F&C Asset Management plc group was created in October 2004 from the merger of F&C and ISIS Asset Management. F&C, which manages GBP103bn, spent a year in negotiations with Mellon over outsourcing of the ISIS business before terminating discussions in November 2005. The outsourcing agreement between ABN AMRO Mellon and F&C Netherlands is not affected.

15MAY07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Country Club Bank of Kansas City, Missouri, as custodian for its capital markets group. BNY will provide custody, safekeeping, settlement and investment reporting services for a portfolio of more than USD1bn of fixed income assets.

15MAY07: JPMorgan has appointed Huw Jones as head of private equity fund services in London. Jones was most recently CFO of a UK-based biotechnology venture capital firm. In addition to running the London office, Jones will focus on providing fund administration services to private equity firms in the EMEA region. He will report to James Hutter, head of private equity fund services.

11MAY07: Northern Trust has scored a significant success in Australia, where it has been selected by the Future Fund Board of Guardians to provide global custody and related services to the Future Fund, which currently has approximately AUD51bn (USD42bn) in assets. Northern believes that the mandate is the largest ever awarded by an Australian institution.

The Future Fund was created in 2006 by the Australian government with the purpose of accumulating sufficient financial assets to offset the government’s unfunded superannuation liability, which is expected to grow to over AUD140 billion by 2020.

Gordon McKellar, head of operations for the Future Fund, said: “Throughout the selection process we focused on the ability of the custodian to deliver global best practice and innovative solutions with minimal risk to the fund; the organisational alignment of the custodian from a business strategy and people perspective; and a quantitative assessment of the capabilities and services offered. Northern Trust showed it was able to meet the full range of our requirements.”

11MAY07: The Bank of New York is proving to be a strong player in the ETF servicing market, evidenced by its latest mandate as servicing agent and custodian for two newly-launched global Van Eck Market Vectors ETFs. BNY already services all other Van Eck Market Vectors ETF products. The newly created funds are Market Vectors-Russia Fund and Market Vectors-Global Alternative Energy Fund.

Bruce Smith, senior vice president of Van Eck Global, said: “We were systematic and comprehensive in our evaluation process. We chose The Bank of New York for our first ETFs because they had the reputation, technology, and expertise that we required. As our needs have expanded, they have grown along with us.”

11MAY07: Just like relatives, group companies always have the ability to embarrass each other, and so it has proved with HSBC Investments, which has chosen State Street to provide collateral management services in the UK. In 2004 HSBC Asset Management agreed to outsource its UK investment and treasury operations to HSBC’s securities services unit.

11MAY07: The Bank of New York now services more than USD1.5trn of tri-party balances worldwide. BNY reports that it has experienced a 50pct increase in tri-party balances globally over the past two years: international balances have grown from USD154bn in 2005 to nearly USD300bn today, with the US posting gains from USD827bn to USD1.25trn over the same period.

09MAY07: Guardian Capital Group Limited, the Canadian financial services company, has selected RBC Dexia Investor Services to provide custody, recordkeeping, fund administration and securities lending for its portfolio of pooled funds and corporate securities.

09MAY07: Richard Ernesti has been appointed as global head of prime brokerage client management for Citigroup. He will report to Ali Hackett and Tom Tesauro, co-heads of equity finance. Ernesti was previously head of international securities and fund services sales and head of global hedge fund administration sales for the bank’s global transaction services business.

08MAY07: Mellon has been selected by the State of North Carolina to provide global custody, foreign exchange and performance analytics for USD75bn in tax-exempt assets, most of which are in seven state-sponsored pension plans.

08MAY07: PFPC, a member of The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc., has been selected to provide administration services to the BB&T Funds and BB&T Variable Insurance Funds, a group of 30 funds representing 65,000 shareholder accounts and $5.5 billion in assets. BB&T Asset Management is investment adviser to the funds. PFPC will provide fund accounting, transfer agency, financial and regulatory administration, and distribution services. In addition, PFPC will offer chief compliance officer support services.

08MAY07: Fulcrum Limited, the alternatives asset administrator, has appointed Chris Mulhern as managing director, Canada. As part of Fulcrum’s global executive management team, Mulhern will have overall responsibility for the management, production and delivery of fund administration services to Fulcrum’s hedge fund clients. Mulhern joins from Citco Fund Services, where he was managing director of the Toronto office, overseeing 480 staff. He was with Citco in various positions for over ten years in Canada, New York and San Francisco.

02MAY07: BISYS, the US provider of outsourcing services, has entered into a definitive agreement under which Citi will acquire all of its outstanding shares in a transaction valued at approximately USD1.45bn.

Citi will combine BISYS Fund Services and Alternative Investment Services, which provide administration and distribution services for mutual funds, hedge funds, private equity funds, and other investment products, with its own operations. Simultaneously, JC Flowers, a private equity firm, will acquire BISYS's Insurance Services Group and Retirement Services business from Citi.

BISYS has effectively been up for sale since it launched a review of strategic alternatives last August. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of this year and is subject to BISYS shareholder approval and to regulatory approvals in the United States, Ireland and Bermuda.

02MAY07: Claymore Investments, Inc. has selected RBC Dexia Investor Services to provide global custody, fund administration and securities lending services for its nine recently launched exchange-traded funds. Claymore Investments, Inc. is the wholly-owned Canadian subsidiary of Claymore Group Inc., a US investment firm.

“One of our top priorities was to identify an investment services provider with an exceptional track record and a truly global operating model,” said Som Seif, president of Claymore Investments. “After evaluating the alternatives available in the marketplace, we are confident that RBC Dexia provides the best strategic fit to help us achieve our long-term business objectives.”

02MAY07: The Bank of New York has been selected by Riyad Bank to support one of the first tri-party repo transactions in the Middle East. Abdulaziz Al-Malki, executive vice president of treasury and investment for Riyad Bank, said: “We selected The Bank of New York because it is the world’s leading tri-party repo provider with the expertise and capacity to meet our requirements both now and in the future.”

01MAY07: The United States Natural Gas Fund, a commodity-based exchange-traded fund investing in natural gas futures contracts which is managed by Victoria Bay Asset Management, has selected Brown Brothers Harriman as the fund’s custodian and administrator. BBH will provide custody, cash management, administration and transfer agency.

01MAY07: Citigroup has been appointed by The National Bank of Kazakhstan to act as a custodian for approximately USD5bn of The National Fund of the Republic of Kazakhstan’s assets. Citi will also act as securities lending agent.

Medet Sartbayev, deputy governor at The National Bank of Kazakhstan, said: “With our fund growing at such a significant rate, we initiated a search for an additional custodian and Citi designed a customised custody and securities lending solution to meet our growing needs. Citi's global reach, extensive local capabilities and strong credit rating made them a natural partner for us.” In 2004 NBK appointed The Bank of New York to provide global custody, investment accounting, performance measurement, compliance monitoring and securities lending services for over USD3bn.

01MAY07: Northern Trust has been selected to provide fund administration services to the Guernsey-listed EUR816m BH Macro Limited fund. BH Macro Ltd. will invest in the Brevan Howard Master Fund, a hedge fund with a predominant exposure to global fixed income and foreign exchange markets. The Brevan Howard Master Fund is one of the largest hedge funds in Europe with assets in excess of USD12bn.

01MAY07: JPMorgan has been appointed to provide custody, fund accounting and associated services for Pension Insurance Corporation, a new financial institution that intends to provide up to GBP20bn of new capacity to the UK pensions insurance market.

01MAY07: The Bank of New York has been selected by Lehman Brothers to act as collateral agent for one of the first tri-party repurchase agreement transactions involving an Asian entity in the local market. BNY services more than USD1.3trn in tri-party balances worldwide.

01MAY07: State Street has appointed Kevin Sullivan and Neil Wright as senior vice presidents with responsibility for overseeing the development of the firm’s derivative processing capabilities.

Sullivan co-founded Eagle Investments Systems in 1989. The company was acquired by Mellon Financial in 2001, and Sullivan remained to serve as Eagle’s chief technology officer up until 2006. At State Street, Sullivan will be responsible for building the technology infrastructure to support the company’s derivative processing. Wright joins from Citigroup where he was a director of derivative operations. Prior to this role, he was senior vice president of asset manager solutions for JPMorgan Chase. He will be responsible for developing strategies to support State Street’s derivative servicing capabilities.

01MAY07: All Dubai International Financial Exchange equities are now eligible for settlement in Clearstream, via Deutsche Bank, a member of DIFX. Clearstream clients can settle domestic free and against payment transactions in all DIFX eligible equities with counterparties of the DIFX via Deutsche Bank.

01MAY07: Andreas Wolf has been appointed chief executive officer of Clearstream Banking Frankfurt. CBF is Germany’s central securities depository and forms part of Clearstream International, the post-trade services arm of Deutsche Börse Group. Wolf joined Clearstream in 2000 after 11 years with Commerzbank. Most recently he was head of customer service.

20APR07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Global Capital Partners, a subsidiary of Global Investment House, to service its Global Buyout Fund, which will target buyout opportunities in the Middle East and North Africa, Turkey, China, India and Pakistan.

19APR07: Société Générale Securities Services has appointed Paolo Crozzoli as head of sales for SGSS Investor Services in Italy. Based in Milan, he will report to Massimo Cotella, head of SGSS Investor Services in Italy, and Sébastien Danloy, head of investor services sales. Crozzoli joins from State Street, where he was a vice president for sales and marketing in Luxembourg and Italy. From 2000 to 2004 he was vice president, business development for PFPC International.

19APR07: Capita Financial Services, part of the Capita Group, has acquired Global Fund Administration Limited. GFA is a provider of fund administration services to hedge funds and operates principally from Gibraltar. GFA offers specialist fund administration services to 20 fund managers and 45 hedge funds with more than GBP1bn of assets under administration.

19APR07: Bernard Hanratty has been appointed as funds services head for Citi’s securities and funds services business in EMEA. He will be responsible for Citi’s managed funds, transfer agency, fiduciary services, and asset management solutions businesses. Hanratty was previously securities and fund services head for Ireland, and will continue to be based in Dublin, reporting to Clive Triance, COO of securities and funds services in EMEA, and Bob Wallace, global head of funds.

At the same time, Steven Caluwaerts has been appointed EMEA fund accounting head. Reporting to Hanratty, he will be responsible for the product development and management of fund accounting and administration services.

19APR07: EuroCCP, a subsidiary of the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, has been selected to provide clearing and settlement services for Turquoise. Turquoise is the consortium of seven financial institutions that are working to develop a new pan-European trading platform. Turquoise is backed by Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Citi and UBS, which together generate around half of Europe's equity order traffic.

EuroCCP will provide all clearing, settlement and risk management services to Turquoise. Citi's global transaction services business has been appointed as EuroCCP settlement agent. Under the agreement, EuroCCP will accept trades from the Turquoise trading platform and these trades will then be netted on trade date. EuroCCP will guarantee trades upon receipt and validation. For all trading members of Turquoise that are not clearing members of EuroCCP, these trades will be handled through general clearing member relationships. EuroCCP will apply risk-based margining, with appropriate levels of margin collected on a daily basis. Any unsettled obligations will be marked-to-market each day. Citi's global transaction services business will process EuroCCP's settlement instructions for delivering and receiving securities and related payments in various currencies through its local securities network.

EuroCCP will be a UK Recognised Clearing House, headquartered in London. DTCC is in the process of filing an application with the Financial Services Authority to receive such recognition in time for the Turquoise launch date. EuroCCP will be operated on an at-cost basis, and any excess revenues collected beyond the cost to support the operation will be refunded to participant members.

18APR07: JPMorgan has won a mandate to provide property and private equity fund accounting and administrative services for the National Pensions Reserve Fund (NPRF), Ireland’s state pension reserve fund. The mandate was awarded by the National Treasury Management Agency, which manages the NPRF. The fund was valued at EUR18.8bn at the end of 2006. The National Treasury Management Agency projects the value of the NPRF's property and private equity portfolios will be at least EUR2bn each by 2009.

Five years ago, when the NPRF had assets of EUR8bn, ABN AMRO Mellon was appointed to provide global custody, securities lending, compliance monitoring and analytics for the fund.

18APR07: State Street has reported record quarterly earnings of USD1.7bn. Net income for the first quarter was USD314m, with total assets under custody up to USD12.3trn. Mellon also reported better numbers after a lacklustre 2006: quarterly fees for asset servicing rose by 12pct to USD252m, with AUC rising to USD4.8trn. Northern Trust turned in another strong performance, with AUC growing to USD3.8trn and custody and administration fees rising by 12pct.

18APR07: eSecLending, the electronic securities lending platform, has announced that its chairman, Susan Peters, is to leave the company. No replacement has been announced.

18APR07: The London operations of HSBC Securities Services are to relocate from their distinctly unimpressive quarters at Mariner House in the City of London to the group head office in Canary Wharf. The move will happen between May and June.

17APR07: Sheena Wilson has been appointed as the new chief executive officer of Mellon India. Previously head of human resources for Mellon International, Wilson succeeds Robert Parkinson and will be based at Mellon's offices in Pune. Parkinson has returned to the US to take on other responsibilities within Mellon. Opened in 2004, Pune is staffed by 550 Mellon employees. Mellon expects its Pune operations to expand to employ more than 1,000 staff over the next three years.

17APR07: ICAP, the world’s largest inter-dealer broker, has launched i-Sec, a new securities lending electronic trading platform. Initially, equities from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK and Japan will be available for lending and borrowing on the i-Sec platform, with a view to expanding this product offering. Four banks are participating in the introduction of the platform. Based on ICAP’s BrokerTec platform, i-Sec offers traders full anonymity until execution, and price transparency with full price levels and market depth display.

12APR07: JPMorgan has launched two new investment improvement services: Manager Consistency Analysis and Marginal Risk Analysis. These are designed to help asset managers, pension plans and endowment funds to achieve greater risk-adjusted returns.

Manager Consistency Analysis is an investment manager scoring product for all asset classes. Managers are ranked based upon consistency of risk-adjusted performance. The product helps identify investment managers who generate consistent alpha. Institutional investors will be able to use the analysis to select more reliable managers and avoid more inconsistent managers.

Marginal Risk Analysis enables investors to explore different levels of risk and return that could result from future changes in asset allocation or investment manager selection. Users will be able to make incremental improvements to their portfolios in the attempt to increase returns and decrease risk.

12APR07: State Street has expanded its relationship with Paternoster, the UK insurance company which takes responsibility for the risks associated with companies’ defined benefit pension schemes. In addition to custody and securities lending, State Street will now provide Paternoster with collateral management services.

“Collateral management is particularly important given our complex liability-driven investment style,” said Mark Wood, Paternoster’s chief executive. “We trust State Street to help us achieve our aim of delivering the best possible returns whilst minimising risk and cost effectively.”

10APR07: Schroder Investment Management (Luxembourg) S.A. has selected RBC Dexia to provide locally-required Canadian sub-recordkeeping services for 23 of its Luxembourg investment funds, which are being distributed to offshore clients through the Canadian investment dealer network. In 2004, Schroders selected Dexia Fund Services to provide recordkeeping services for its investment funds distributed to offshore clients via US intermediaries.

“We are extremely confident in our selection of RBC Dexia,” said Gary Janaway, head of operations for Schroder Fund Services Luxembourg. “Their people have consistently demonstrated a willingness to understand our long-term objectives and a desire to help us grow our business. We enjoyed a very positive relationship with Dexia Fund Services prior to their joint venture and have been particularly impressed with the new company's expanded range of capabilities and global reach. We found they were uniquely positioned to help support our growth in new jurisdictions around the world, such as Canada, and that was a significant factor in our decision.”

10APR07: JPMorgan is to expand its fund services operation in Boston, hiring new employees and leasing larger office space. The business has hired more than 150 staff in the past year and plans to take on more this year. The firm recently signed a lease to expand into new office space at 1 Beacon Street. JPMorgan Fund Services has USD3.3trn in assets under management globally.

05APR07: The Bank of New York has won two custody mandates in the Netherlands, including its first publicised external mandate since it announced its alliance with ING in October 2002.

BNY has been appointed by Dutch transport insurance company TVM Verzekeringen as its global custodian, covering EUR300m in assets from TVM’s insurance companies and the related pension fund.

Stichting Pensioenfonds ING has awarded BNY a further custody mandate for a EUR2.2bn fixed income portfolio. The pension fund has approximately EUR10bn of assets and the majority of the residual balance is invested in mutual funds, which are also administered by BNY.

05APR07: Kookmin Bank, South Korea’s leading bank and investment fund distributor, has chosen Vestima+, Clearstream’s automated order routing service for the investment funds industry. With a customer base that includes approximately half of South Korea's adult population, Kookmin Bank has a dominant position in the country's banking sector, the third largest in Asia. Kookmin Bank is listed on NYSE and is Korea’s largest custodian.

05APR07: Mellon Analytical Solutions, the performance and analytics arm of Mellon Financial Corporation, has appointed Michael Simpson as a client relationship manager. Simpson joins Mellon from The WM Company, the financial performance measurement subsidiary of State Street, where he was a senior client relationship manager within the UK performance division. Simpson will report to Allison Langley, head of client relationship management for Mellon Analytical Solutions.

04APR07: BNP Paribas has signed an agreement to acquire RBS International Securities Services (Holdings) Limited, a 70/30 joint venture between The Royal Bank of Scotland International and The Bank of New York. The business offers securities-related services in the UK offshore markets of Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. With 176 employees, it holds over GBP30bn of assets under custody and GBP6.2bn of assets under administration.

04APR07: PEAK6 Performance Management LLC has appointed Fortis Prime Fund Solutions as fund administrator. Peak6 Performance Management LLC is a group of volatility arbitrage funds managed by Peak6 Advisors LLC of Chicago. Fortis administers USD255 billion of alternative assets.

04APR07: Mellon is to administer the middle and back office for the managed accounts business of Bear Stearns Asset Management. Among the services that Mellon will provide are account opening and maintenance, transaction support, custodian reconciliation, and investor reporting services. Mellon currently administers approximately 65,000 managed accounts, representing USD35bn in assets.

04APR07: SEI has appointed Stephen Barbalaco as EMEA sales director for global private banking. He will be based in London, reporting to Brandon Sharrett, managing director of SEI’s global private banking business in the EMEA region. Prior to joining SEI, Barbalaco spent two years as head of sales strategy, client relationships, marketing and transitions for Mphasis BFL, a business process outsourcing firm based in Bangalore.

04APR07: ABN AMRO Mellon has been appointed by Buckinghamshire County Council Pension Fund to provide global custody, investment accounting and performance measurement solutions for assets valued at GBP1bn. The assets were transferred from the outgoing custodian, The Bank of New York, on April 2.

04APR07: Northern Trust has rolled out performance reporting enhancements that enable stock-level attribution. The product measures the relative performance of individual stocks in a portfolio against established benchmarks and reports those results on a daily or monthly basis.

04APR07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Banco De Mocambique, the central bank of the Republic of Mozambique, to act as global custodian and securities lending agent for its foreign reserves.

30MAR07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Société Européenne de Banque as custodian for its UK and Irish assets. Société Européenne de Banque is based in Luxembourg and is a member of Gruppo Intesa Sanpaolo.

30MAR07: Euroclear Bank is to open a representative office in Frankfurt. Initially, the representative office will be staffed by four full-time employees and run by Katherine Starks, who joins Euroclear from GL Trade.

29MAR07: State Street has won a shared servicing mandate from Bank of China for the foreign currency insurance funds of China Life Insurance Company Limited, the largest life insurance company and one of the largest institutional investors in mainland China.

State Street says this is the first offshore insurance investment fund awarded as a jointly-serviced mandate in mainland China. Under the arrangement, Bank of China will provide domestic master custody services and State Street will provide global custody, fund accounting, foreign exchange, performance measurement and compliance reporting services for the foreign currency insurance assets of China Life. State Street will provide these services from its operations centre in Hong Kong.

28MAR07: Northern Trust is understood to have hired Peter Cherecwich to take up a new role as head of institutional strategy and product development for the corporate and institutional services business. Cherecwich, who will report to Tim Theriault, the head of C&IS, was most recently at State Street, where he was head of the investment operations outsourcing business. He also held positions as head of product and technology solutions and head of investor services in Japan. Cherecwich is currently believed to be on gardening leave and will not join Northern until July.

28MAR07: ABN AMRO Mellon has appointed Nikola Todorovic as securities lending sales specialist. Todorovic joins from Thompson Financial, where he was a relationship manager. He will be based in the UK and will report to Mark Tidy, securities lending product manager.

28MAR07: Société Générale has rounded out its services for derivatives products by launching a middle-office outsourcing solution for structured and OTC derivatives products. SocGen already provides pricing services, performance attribution and risk calculation for these products.

28MAR07: Linda Bernard, director of product management for institutional custody at CIBC Mellon, is to move to Thomas Murray as a consultant in the North American region. She joins Arti Sharma, who also worked at CIBC Mellon until joining Thomas Murray at the beginning of 2006.

27MAR07: Société Générale Securities Services has been appointed to provide fund services to HFIM Evolution Funds, the inaugural fund of hedge funds launch by London-based manager HFIM. This Irish domiciled fund will be serviced out of SG’s operations in Dublin. HFIM Evolution Funds plc is an EU-domiciled fund, incorporated in Ireland and regulated by the Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority.

Tushar Patel, chief investment officer and joint CEO of HFIM, said: “With operational risk an increasing focus for investors, SG’s sound reputation in the fund services arena for alternative asset classes, coupled with its global branding and presence, establishes immediate credibility in the minds of investors and capital allocators.”

27MAR07: Allison Coleman has joined Northern Trust’s North America asset servicing sales team, focusing on the not-for-profit market including foundations, endowments and healthcare organisations. Based in New York, Coleman reports to Jeff Conover, senior vice president and head of North American sales. Coleman joins Northern Trust from JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services, where she led new business development in the not-for-profit sector.

27MAR07: Ziegler Exchange Traded Trust has selected JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services to support the newly-launched NYSE Arca Tech 100 ETF. JPMorgan will provide fund accounting, fund administration, transfer agency and custody services for the new ETF that replicates the NYSE Arca Tech 100 Index, which represents 100 companies in technology and related industries.

“We chose JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services because it offers extensive experience in ETFs, a wide range of services and a dedicated group to support ETFs,” said Caroline Probst, chief financial officer and treasurer of the Ziegler Exchange Traded Trust.

Ziegler Capital Management, LLC, is the investment advisor to Ziegler Exchange Traded Trust and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Ziegler Companies, Inc., an investment banking and investment services boutique. Ziegler Capital Management currently manages approximately USD3.4bn in fixed-income and equity assets, including USD1.4bn in mutual fund investments.

27MAR07: Clearstream has launched the Central Facility for Funds (CFF) with the first two pilot firms, Schroder Investment Management (Luxembourg) and Pictet & Cie (Europe). CFF offers a post-trade solution for investment funds domiciled in Luxembourg, the largest market in Europe for international funds with over €EUR1.7trn of assets under management.

All the investment fund shares handled by Schroder and Pictet, two transfer agents, have been transferred to the new platform which provides DvP settlement services based on simultaneous exchange of cash and securities between fund distributors and transfer agents.

CFF offers for all participating firms (transfer agents, fund distributors and fund promoters) one single set of settlement and payment instructions for all eligible funds which should accelerate and simplify operational processes as well as reduce risk. The CFF service is fully integrated with Clearstream’s existing ICSD custody and settlement services on Creation, its electronic settlement platform.

Following the pilot, which will include four other investment fund firms, CFF will then be open to all Luxembourg transfer agents as well as transfer agents from other markets dealing in Luxembourg domiciled funds.

27MAR07: Following Ellen Alemany’s departure, Paul Galant has been appointed as head of Citigroup’s global transaction services business. Galant moves from his current role as head of cash management.

23MAR07: Ellen Alemany, who was appointed head of Citigroup’s transaction services business in January 2006, is leaving the firm to become CEO of RBS America. At Citi, Alemany replaced Frank Bisignano, who moved to JPMorgan Chase as chief administrative officer.

23MAR07: Citigroup is making further progress in Canada after purchasing Unisen in 2005. Citi has been appointed by AIC Limited and Copernican Capital Corp to provide fund accounting services for their investment funds. Citi, AIC and Copernican Capital Corp have reached provisional agreement on the delivery of a broader range of securities services, including custody and securities lending. As part of the agreement, approximately 40 AIC professionals will transfer to Citi, and Citi will lease space in AIC’s offices in Burlington to supplement its current facilities.

AIC started operations in 1985 and has grown to become one of Canada’s largest privately-held mutual fund companies with assets under management exceeding USD8bn.

23MAR07: Just six months after Gail Burke was controversially transferred from Australia to become chief operating officer for BNP Paribas Securities Services in the UK, she is returning to Australia “for personal reasons”. She is to be replaced by Stephen Turner, who joined the business from Citi in 2005 as head of global fund services product.

23MAR07: Clearstream is opening two new representative offices in Singapore and Tokyo. Both offices will report to Clearstream’s Hong Kong headquarters for Asia and the Middle East, which has been run by Philippe Metoudi since 1992.

22MAR07: BNP Paribas has agreed to buy Exelbank, a subsidiary of Banco Sabadell specialising in custody services. Exelbank provides custody and settlement services to Spanish and international financial institutions, depositary bank services to mutual and pension funds and outsourcing services related to investment operations and private banking. The subsidiary, which has its origins in Banco Urquijo, is more than 40 years old, and has some EUR18bn in assets under custody and serves more than 150 funds, managed by approximately 25 investment managers.

21MAR07: State Street has appointed Catherine Williams as a vice president in the US institutional investor sales team. Based in Chicago, Williams will be responsible for the US public fund industry. She will report to Jay Carty, senior vice president and head of sales for State Street's institutional investor services.

Prior to joining State Street, Williams spent more than 15 years at Northern Trust in sales and relationship management roles. Last September, Williams was transferred from her relationship management job to a senior sales role within the US institutional asset servicing sales team.

21MAR07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has been appointed depository bank and fund administrator by Siitnedif SGIIC, the alternative investment manager of Spain’s Fidentiis Equities Group, for its new Tordesillas hedge fund. The Tordesillas fund is a long-short equities fund that will invest mainly in Spanish and Portuguese stocks.

BNP Paribas will provide investment administration services including fund accounting, NAV calculation and investment compliance monitoring and, via an outsourcing agreement, will also prepare regulatory reporting for the fund as well as assisting Siitnedif in preparing reports for its investors.

Ricardo Seixas, managing director of Siitnedif, said: “We chose BNP Paribas because of its clear support of the new hedge fund industry in Spain that is now established following local regulatory change. BNP Paribas also brings us a proven experience in other European markets, as well as the commitment to take leadership in adapting services to meet local requirements here in Spain.”

20MAR07: Omgeo, a provider of trade management services, has reshuffled its global sales team. Tim Keady has been promoted to managing director, global sales and relationship management. Keady replaces Martin Brennan, who is taking on a new role of managing director, business development for Asia Pacific and Europe, Middle East and Africa. Lee Cutrone, managing director of industry relations, will now also oversee Omgeo’s global marketing function. All three report to Marianne Brown, president and chief executive officer.

20MAR07: Deutsche Börse has tightened up its executive board in the wake of the departure of two of its members, Matthias Ganz and Mathias Hlubek. Under CEO Reto Francioni, the executive board will consist of six members, including the CFO and the executive board member responsible for IT. Frank Gerstenschläger will be responsible for the new cash market unit; Andreas Preuss and Jeffrey Tessler will maintain their positions of responsibility for derivatives/clearing and securities settlement/custody respectively, and Michael Kuhn remains responsible for IT. A new CFO is being sought, whilst the position of chief operating officer is to be dispensed with.

19MAR07: The long-running negotiations over which bank would buy the securities processing and custody business of HypoVereinsbank have finally been concluded. CACEIS, the French specialist administrator, has entered into exclusive talks with HVB, which is owned by the UniCredit Group. The sale is expected to be concluded by the end of 2007, subject to regulatory approvals. The German operations of CACEIS will be based in Munich and CACEIS intends to retain the existing HVB teams.

19MAR07: Mellon has appointed Steve Lane as a client relationship executive in London. Lane joins Mellon from Citigroup, where he was vice president and relationship manager responsible for managing major client relationships in the UK and Europe, with a particular focus on the Middle East. Prior to joining Citigroup, Lane held senior global custody operations positions at The Bank of New York and State Street. Lane will report to Lawrence Langenhan, head of client relations within Mellon’s asset servicing business development team. Lane’s primary responsibility will be to focus on managing major client relationships of Mellon’s fund accounting and transfer agency businesses.

15MAR07: Sean Moran has joined Fulcrum Limited, a global administrator for the hedge fund and alternative asset management industry, as director of client relations in the US. Based in New York, Moran joins Fulcrum from HSBC Alternative Fund Services in New York where he was manager, client relations. He spent 12 years at HSBC and Bank of Bermuda working in various positions in Bermuda and Hong Kong.

13MAR07: Citigroup has finally broken one of the last taboos in the industry, becoming the first major custodian to launch an integrated hedge fund servicing business that will combine financing, prime brokerage, consulting services and operational support.

The hedge fund services group will unite related activities across its capital markets and transaction services businesses. Among the services provided are:

Equity finance and prime brokerage

Fixed income prime brokerage

Foreign exchange prime brokerage

Hedge fund administration

Capital introduction and capital raising services

Hedge fund relationship management

Start-up and consulting services

Steve Bowman, most recently the head of fixed income sales, will lead the new business, reporting to Jamie Forese, head of equities, and Neeraj Sahai, head of securities and fund services.

08MAR07: The Bank of New York has been appointed as service provider and sub-advisor for six new WisdomTree earnings-weighted exchange traded funds that are listed on the American Stock Exchange. BNY will provide worldwide custody, accounting, fund administration and specialized ETF services, as well as serving as sub-advisor for each of the new ETFs through BNY Asset Management. BNY already serves a similar role for 30 other WisdomTree ETFs that trade on the New York Stock Exchange. The WisdomTree ETFs have USD2.6bn in assets.

08MAR07: The Bank of New York has hired five new people top work in its hedge fund administration and broker/dealer services teams. They will all be based in London and will report to David Aldrich, managing director in charge of European broker/dealers and hedge funds. Elizabeth Fitzgibbons joins from Fortis Bank as a hedge fund relationship manager in the alternative investment services business. Elin Toerre joins the bank’s hedge fund administration sales team from EFG Eurofinancière d’Investissements in Monaco, where she was a hedge fund analyst. Neil Atkinson joins the securities industry banking division and will be responsible for business development in the broker/dealer and investment bank client executive team. He joins from Euroclear SA/NV. Maura O’Sullivan joins the securities industry banking division as a credit analyst from EDF Energy. David Prestwich joins the bank’s broker/dealer services team as a relationship manager. He was a client relationship manager with JPMorgan, where he looked after both French and UK broker/dealers and hedge funds.

06MAR07: State Street’s long-running search for a managing director for its UK investor services business has resulted in an internal appointment. Michael Walsh is to run the firm’s investment servicing business in the UK, Middle East and Africa. Walsh has been responsible for managing State Street’s investment servicing business in Scotland since October 2005. He joined State Street in 2004 as head of WM Performance Services, the company’s European performance measurement division. Prior to joining State Street, Walsh was with HSBC Investment Funds in the UK, most recently serving as managing director and head of investment services. Walsh replaces Peter Baker who assumed the role of head of investment servicing for State Street in Asia (ex Japan), based in Singapore. Walsh will report to Peter O’Neill, executive vice president and head of State Street’s investment servicing and investment research and trading businesses for UKMEA.

06MAR07: Jim Clark, who was head of sales and marketing for State Street in Luxembourg, is joining JPMorgan as head of transfer agency services in Europe, Middle East and Africa, reporting to Susan Ebenston. He will be based in Luxembourg. Clark has also worked for IFDS and Citibank.

05MAR07: JPMorgan has been appointed custodian and provider of related services by the Wellcome Trust, the world’s second-largest charitable foundation. Under the agreement, JPMorgan will provide custody, accounting, monthly performance measurement, cash products and foreign exchange services, passive currency overlay and commission recapture for GBP9.5bn of assets. State Street is believed to be the outgoing custodian.

Danny Truell, chief investment officer of the Wellcome Trust, said: “As the Wellcome Trust strives to continue to be at the forefront of investment management, we needed a securities services partner that could provide us with top-quality service, a stable service platform and also had the skill set to grow with us. JPMorgan’s asset servicing offering is substantial enough and has the technology to meet all of our requirements.”

02MAR07: Northern Trust has been awarded a GBP300m mandate from London Borough of Hounslow for custody and commission recapture. “We selected Northern Trust as we knew we could look forward to a long term relationship based on trust,” said Alan Steele, director of finance at London Borough of Hounslow. “Northern Trust's long experience in serving the local government pension scheme sector and its strong existing LGPS franchise were very important to us.”

01MAR07: The London Borough of Southwark Pension Fund has appointed JPMorgan to provide custody and fund accounting for its GBP733m pension fund. JPMorgan’s transition management team recently completed an asset restructuring for the Southwark Pension Fund, involving GBP520m of equity assets divided among three fund managers.

01MAR07: Banco Commercial Portugues, the largest privately owned financial group in Portugal, has appointed The Bank of New York as global custodian for USD1.6bn of assets. The appointment will also see BNY provide BCP with FX services.

01MAR07: Richard Tempany has joined BISYS Alternative Investment Services as a vice president of relationship management in the London office. Tempany has worked with F&C Investments, Prolific Asset Management and INVESCO in the UK and with Pioneer Investments in Dublin. In 2003, Tempany left Pioneer to open his own consulting firm to provide corporate and technical advisory services.

01MAR07: Euroclear Bank has introduced a collateral re-use feature which enables triparty collateral management clients to increase the liquidity of their securities collateral by re-using these securities to cover multiple exposures arising from repos, securities lending, derivatives or other collateralised transactions with different counterparties. Triparty collateral management deals outstanding at Euroclear Bank rose by 25pct in 2006 to a daily average of EUR308.7bn.

28FEB07: BNP Paribas Securities Services (BPSS) is spreading its wings and is expanding its hedge fund administration operations to include services within the US. Located in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, that well-known centre of alternative investment servicing excellence, the hedge fund administration team was formerly part of CooperNeff Advisors, which was acquired by the BNP Paribas Group in 1995.

This team is now integrated into the BPSS management structure and is headed by Andrew Dougherty, chief operating officer for fund administration in the US. Dougherty will report to Philippe Ricard, global head of fund services operations and locally to Christina Feicht, head of BNP Paribas Securities Services North America. Dougherty was previously chief operating officer at BNP Paribas Financial Services. Prior to this, he worked at CooperNeff Advisors, where he spent four years as manager and then vice president, market control & development.

In a related move, Angela Billick, who is based in New York, has been promoted to local product head for global fund services in North America. Billick will report to Luxembourg-based Frederic Pérard, head of global fund services and locally to Christina Feicht. Billick has been with BNP Paribas since March 2005 as vice president of the institutional investors sales team in New York.

27FEB07: JPMorgan has agreed to acquire Integrated Investment Services, the fund services business of Western & Southern Financial Group. IIS provides fund accounting, fund administration and transfer agency services. The acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2007. Terms were not disclosed. IIS has more than 100 employees based in Cincinnati.

27FEB07: Just two weeks after Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (Luxembourg) S.A. announced an extension of its outsourcing relationship with Brown Brothers Harriman, it has appointed The Bank of New York as custodian for USD3.4bn of its UK assets.

27FEB07: Northern Trust has been appointed by Generation Investment Management as its investment operations outsourcing provider. Northern Trust now provides custody, trade services, fund accounting, transfer agency, performance measurement and client reporting across Generation’s fund ranges in Dublin and Delaware, and investment administration support services in connection with its global separate account business.

“As a new firm, we had the opportunity to partner with Northern Trust early on to position our business operations strategically for future growth,” said Peter Harris, chief operating officer of Generation. “We want to focus on managing our clients’ assets and delivering superior investment performance: outsourcing to Northern Trust enables us to do this whilst providing the outstanding operational support we require as we grow our business.”

27FEB07: State Street has announced five new UK pension fund mandates:

The GBP450m Rolls Royce & Bentley Pension Fund will take custody, fund accounting and compliance monitoring services. WM Performance Services will provide performance measurement services.

The GBP140m British Medical Association Pension Scheme has awarded the firm a mandate to provide global custody and investment accounting services, with WM providing performance measurement services.

The London Borough of Tower Hamlets Pension Fund has extended its relationship with a mandate for custody and fund accounting for an additional GBP240m in assets. WM Performance Services currently provides performance measurement services.

Ockham Pension Scheme, previously a client through a tri-party custody relationship, has appointed State Street to provide custody and fund accounting services for GBP70m in assets.

The PONL Pension Scheme will use custody services for GBP50m.

27FEB07: The East Riding of Yorkshire Council has appointed Northern Trust to provide custody for its GBP2bn pension fund. “We spoke to a number of local government schemes as part of the tender process,” said Paul Barnett of East Riding of Yorkshire Council. “We selected Northern Trust as they best met our overall requirements and demonstrated a particularly high regard for client service.”

23FEB07: ProShare Advisors has appointed JPMorgan to provide fund administration services for the launch of 12 new exchange-traded funds, which will trade on the American Stock Exchange. JPMorgan will provide fund accounting, fund administration and custody services. The bank already supports 40 ProShare funds, all of which are based on built–in short or magnified exposure to well-known indices, ranging from broad-based, small cap, mid cap, large cap to sector and style.

“ProShare selected JPMorgan for a full range of fund services for our entire family of ETFs because they are experienced, innovative and provide quality customer service,” said Michael Sapir, CEO of ProShare Advisors LLC.

23FEB07: Northern Trust has been awarded the EUR2.3bn custody mandate to provide global custody, securities lending, commission management, active collateral management, performance and risk reporting, cash management, and foreign exchange trading services to Stichting Bedrijfstakpensioenfonds Zorgverzekeraars (SBZ), the Dutch pension fund for health insurers. Northern Trust was selected following a competitive tender process run by Avida International. 

“We appointed Northern Trust as our global custodian primarily because of its client service culture, and experience with fiduciary managers, as well as its high-quality services which met all our requirements,” said Peter van Gemst, SBZ’s chief financial officer. “Northern Trust’s presence in The Netherlands was also a significant factor in its favour.”

Northern Trust has recently hired new people into its Dutch client service team. Henk Groot has joined the Amsterdam office as a senior relationship manager from KAS BANK. In London, there are two new account managers: Chantal Lambert has joined from ISS, and Ann Dubois, who has transferred from the bank’s investment manager liaison group.

22FEB07: Erik Jens has been appointed as CEO of Fortis Prime Fund Solutions. He is currently business operating officer at commercial and private banking for Fortis. He succeeds Alex Elfers, who will become CEO of strategy, risk management and business development. Jens will report directly to Frans Demmenie, CEO of clearing, funds and custody.

22FEB07: The launch of Euroclear’s single settlement engine (SSE) was completed at the end of January with Euroclear Bank’s transition to the SSE. Full implementation of the SSE is the first major milestone in accomplishing Euroclear’s objective to harmonise services on a consolidated processing platform, merging five Euroclear group settlement platforms into one.

The next step in Euroclear’s migration to a single platform is the launch of ESES (Euroclear settlement for Euronext-zone securities). Using the SSE as its foundation, ESES will operate as a single processing solution for both domestic and cross-border fixed-income and equity transactions in the Belgian, Dutch and French markets. ESES will be launched in Euroclear France at the end of this year and in Euroclear Belgium and Euroclear Nederland in the second quarter of 2008. Euroclear will then enter the final phase of consolidation on to the single platform serving all Euroclear group markets. Starting with custody-related processing in late 2008, all components of the single platform are scheduled to be completed by 2009/2010.

20FEB07: Suffolk County Council Pension Fund, the UK local authority with USD2.4bn of assets, has reappointed State Street as investment services provider. Suffolk has also appointed State Street to provide the fund with securities lending services.

20FEB07: Northern Trust has hired Victoria Russell as a relationship manager within the UK pensions team. She joins from The Bank of New York, where she spent nine years, most recently as a relationship manager within client technology delivery services.

16FEB07: Another senior executive has defected from Mellon to State Street. Following Jack Klinck, a Mellon vice chairman who moved at the end of last year, is Bill Pryor, president and chief executive officer of Mellon Analytical Services. Pryor is taking up a newly created role as senior vice president and head of global performance and analytics services. Based in Boston, Pryor will report to Patrick Centanni, senior vice president and head of State Street’s product and technology solutions team.

16FEB07: The New York State Teachers’ Retirement System has selected JPMorgan as its first non-custody lending agent for fixed income securities totalling USD12bn.

“We chose JPMorgan as our US fixed income securities lending agent after an exhaustive search process and we are confident the programme they laid out will allow us to maximise our investment returns on this asset class,” said John Cardillo, manager of public information for NYSTRS.

14FEB07: Tom Abraham is to join DST International (DSTi) as chief executive officer this spring. DSTi provides business solutions for the financial services industry. Abraham is leaving his post at Citigroup in London, where he was responsible for the investment operations outsourcing business. Abraham joined Citi in 2001, since when the firm has won several high-profile mandates, including Standard Life Investments and AEGON Asset Management. Ken Back, who joined Citi in 2005, is to take on Abraham’s role until a permanent replacement has been appointed.

At DSTi, Abraham will replace Mike Winn, who will retire after 15 years with DSTi. Winn will oversee the transition and take on the role of non-executive chairman. In addition, Steve Edkins has been promoted from DSTi’s chief operating officer to deputy CEO.

14FEB07: Brown Brothers Harriman has announced plans to provide global custody system support to Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ (Luxembourg) S.A. (BTMUL) through Brown Brothers Harriman (Luxembourg) S.C.A.

BBH Luxembourg will offer an integrated technology solution to BTMUL, which will become fully operational by the end of the first quarter of 2008. The BBH technology solution, which will be known as BBH Direct, has been designed to support not only BTMUL’s current book of business but also future business growth.

BBH has had a long-standing relationship with Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corporation and its predecessor companies dating back to the mid 1980s, when BBH began providing US custody and brokerage services to MUTB. BBH has provided global sub-custody services to MUTB since the early 1990s. Following a change in the corporate structure, BTMUL is to be rebranded as Mitsubishi UFJ Global Custody S.A. in April.

14FEB07: ABN AMRO Mellon has been appointed by Agricultural Bank of China to provide global custody and securities lending services for its international assets, and to handle overseas accounting and investment mandate reporting to qualified domestic institutional investors (QDII) in China.

Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) is the second largest commercial bank in China. Chinese law dictates that all offshore investments be routed via local Chinese banks, and in 2006 ABC and ABN AMRO Mellon partnered in a joint bid for a custody mandate from one of the largest local insurance companies in China. The partnership has also included the exchange of product knowledge and training.

Li Ruishan, deputy general manager, Agricultural Bank of China’s international department, said: “ABN AMRO and ABC have established long-lasting, good cooperation on international banking. Based on joint franchises of ABN AMRO Mellon and ABC, the new cooperation on global custody and securities lending will bring to ABC a wider platform for better services for our clients.”

14FEB07: The Bank of New York claims to have doubled the assets for which it provides global risk services from USD500bn to more than USD1trn in two years. The growth has been driven by the introduction of new risk and analytics services, such as daily factor-based attribution, security characteristics and other risk measures.

In 2004, BNY formed a strategic alliance with Wilshire Associates to deliver risk management services to a combined base of 800 institutional investor clients. BNY plans to introduce new risk management capabilities, such as risk budgeting, counterparty exposure monitoring and additional reporting on derivatives in the next year.

14FEB07: Mellon has been selected by Middlebury College, a US liberal arts college, to provide global custody, performance measurement and analytics, and cash management for the college's USD887m endowment.

"Mellon is a top-tier custodian for not-for-profit institutions and has developed the tools that will enable us to manage our endowment as effectively as possible," said Patrick Norton, associate vice president for finance and controller of Middlebury College.

13FEB07: State Street has opened up a significant lead in the US outsourcing market with its appointment by Putnam Investments and The Putnam Funds to provide servicing for USD169bn of assets.

State Street will provide custody, fund accounting and investment operations outsourcing services in support of more than 450 retail, institutional, trust and offshore portfolios as Putnam consolidates its investment service providers. As a result of this mandate, approximately 250 Putnam employees joined State Street last month.

State Street has provided custody services to Putnam since 2003. Last October State Street won a USD150bn outsourcing mandate from Evergreen Investments. Mellon is thought to be one of the big losers in the Putnam consolidation.

13FEB07: ABN AMRO Mellon has expanded its relationship with A&O Services in The Netherlands and is now providing the company with a range of value added services, including investment accounting, performance measurement and attribution, analytical services, benchmarking, regulatory reporting, and independent administration and valuation of private loans. ABN AMRO Mellon has acted as A&O Services' global custodian since the early days of the original ABN AMRO/Mellon strategic marketing alliance. A&O Services was set up by the employers and employees of the Dutch construction sector, and holds assets valued at EUR3.7bn.

13FEB07: Gerry Brady is to join Northern Trust as managing director of its international fund administration operations in Dublin. The Dublin office, which currently employs over 450 people, services over 550 funds with approximately USD100bn in assets under administration. Brady joins from Capita Financial Group in Dublin where he has been managing director for Ireland since 2005.

Vic Holmes, who has been managing director in Dublin, relocates to Guernsey to become chief executive of Northern Trust’s Channel Island businesses and managing director of Northern Trust International Fund Administration Services (Guernsey) Ltd.

13FEB07: BNP Paribas Securities Services is adding three new sales managers to support business expansion with UK institutional investors. Edward Hamilton-Russell joins the team to cover asset managers, Maria Cantillon will cover hedge funds and Tony Sugrue will focus on offshore funds. All three will report to Malcolm Pobjoy, head of institutional investor sales in the UK.

Hamilton-Russell joins from Omgeo. Cantillon most recently worked for HSBC in Singapore. Tony Sugrue is an internal move, having spent 18 years in Luxembourg as a relationship manager for many large UK clients.

13FEB07: Mellon has appointed Richard Crannis as senior compliance manager within its international asset servicing business. He joins Mellon from the UK’s Financial Services Authority where he was most recently responsible for risk management guidance and control to the FSA’s retail markets business unit.

Crannis will report to Andy Beadle, head of Mellon Bank UK risk and compliance, and will be based in Brentwood. He succeeds Katy Parker who has moved into the role of Mellon's money laundering reporting officer.

12FEB07: Tilman Fechter has joined Clearstream to run sales of investment funds services. Fechter will also cover sales in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Eastern Europe. Fechter, a German national, was a principal at Capco in Germany, where he was responsible for strategic projects and business development with a focus on the investment funds business.

07FEB07: Now that Investors Financial is to lose its independence, KAS BANK is possibly the world’s last investment servicing specialist of any scale. KAS is now cleaning up its portfolio of businesses and has reached agreement with Nachenius Tjeenk on the transfer of its private banking activities to Nachenius Tjeenk, the Dutch private banking subsidiary of BNP Paribas. The transaction will involve the transfer to Nachenius Tjeenk of about EUR750m currently managed by KAS. As part of the transaction, Nachenius Tjeenk will also acquire Associatie Cassa, the company within KAS BANK providing fiduciary services to the private banking clientele. The transaction is subject to the approval of the Dutch central bank and is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2007.

07FEB07: The Bank of New York has been selected by Four Capital Partners, a recently launched investment management boutique in the UK, to provide corporate trustee services, fund administration, fund accounting and global custody for its proposed range of institutional equity funds. Four was founded in 2006 to develop traditional and hedge fund business directed at institutional investors. Initially investments will be managed in two Dublin domiciled UCITS III funds, one long-only and one long-short fund.

07FEB07: Royal Liver Group, the UK financial services company, has expanded its mandate with Mellon to provide a range of fund services including accounting, transfer agency and custody. Custody will be provided through Mellon’s joint venture, ABN AMRO Mellon. This will increase the value of the assets serviced to GBP3bn.

This appointment follows Royal Liver's restructuring of its retail business in 2006 and the introduction of an active manager of managers strategy across its group assets. As part of this restructure, Mellon will also be supporting Royal Liver in the launch of four new retail global managed fund of funds in March 2007.

07FEB07: The International Capital Market Association (ICMA) has appointed Kevin Milne as managing director of ICMA Ltd, the UK subsidiary mainly responsible for operating the association’s technology products and services. Milne will be a member of ICMA’s executive committee. The post of managing director of ICMA Ltd was previously held for over 20 years by Roy Lambert, who retired in January. Milne recently left SS&C Technologies, where he was head of the international business. He made his name at Thomson Financial, where he ran the electronic settlements group in Europe, Middle East and Africa until 2003.

07FEB07: Aberdeen Asset Management has chosen SEI as its administrator for its push into the US mutual fund market. Aberdeen will use SEI to provide fund administration, accounting, investor servicing, marketing and distribution. The turnkey solution also provides an independent board of trustees. In the UK, Aberdeen has an outsourcing relationship with BNP Paribas, which does not provide services in the US.

06FEB07: ABN AMRO Mellon has been appointed by Wiltshire County Council to provide global custody, investment accounting, securities lending and performance measurement services for assets valued at GBP1.1bn. Transition has already taken place. Wiltshire used consultant Thomas Murray to conduct a formal custody review.

06FEB07: The Bank of New York has expanded its independent valuation service for OTC derivative products and asset classes to include European swaptions, foreign exchange options and OTC equity options. BNY already provides valuation services for interest rate swaps and credit default swaps.

In addition, BNY has established a derivatives product team led by Ahmad Sharif, a managing director within global investor services, which is focused on creating “a comprehensive end-to-end process for servicing derivatives used by hedge funds and institutional investors”.

06FEB07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has hired Luc Dawans as head of fund administration operations in Belgium. He joins from RBC Dexia in Brussels, where he spent five years in the firm’s investment operations division, the last two as head of fund administration. He will report locally to Renaud Vandenplas, general manager of BNP Paribas Securities Services in Belgium, and functionally to Franck Dubois, chief operating officer of BNP Paribas Securities Services in Luxembourg.

06FEB07: HSBC Securities Services has hired Matthew Adams to work in its UK pensions relationship management team. He comes from Northern Trust.

06FEB07: The Bank of New York has hired Josée Denis as vice president, European transfer agency, based in Luxembourg. She will report to Deborah Lorenzen, managing director. Denis has over 20 years of experience in investment management operations, mainly at Chase Manhattan Bank, State Street and Fleming Fund Management in Luxembourg. Prior to her appointment at BNY, she spent seven years as a director in PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Luxembourg advisory services practice.

05FEB07: State Street Corporation has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Investors Financial Services Corporation (IFIN) in a stock transaction valued at approximately USD4.5bn. Each company’s board of directors has approved the agreement. The transaction, which is subject to customary conditions, including regulatory and IFIN’s stockholders’ approval, is expected to close by the third quarter of 2007. Once the transaction has closed, State Street will have more than USD14trn in assets under custody.

IFIN is the holding company for Investors Bank & Trust Company, the Boston-based administrator that has USD2.2trn AUC. IFIN has been in business for 17 years, growing out of the back office of a US fund manager. The bank has acquired a strong reputation for client service and has a good roster of US clients, including Barclays Global Investors, but has failed to make headway overseas and struggled in 2006 with a lack of cost control.

02FEB07: Martine Dinne, chief executive officer of Euroclear Bank, is to retire in June. Dinne has been at Euroclear for nearly forty years, and is a member of the management committee of Euroclear SA/NV, the parent company.

Frédéric Hannequart, currently chief financial officer of Euroclear SA/NV and Euroclear Bank, will take on new oversight responsibilities for the commercial and product management divisions. He will also become chairman of the Euroclear Bank board of directors, replacing Pierre Francotte, and remains a member of the management committee of Euroclear SA/NV. Francotte will continue in his role as chief executive officer and chairman of the management committee of Euroclear SA/NV.

Euroclear’s new chief financial officer and member of the management committee of Euroclear SA/NV will be André Rolland, who joins Euroclear from Caisse d’Epargne in Paris where he was chief risk officer. Yves Poullet will become chief executive officer of Euroclear Bank. He is currently chief operating officer of Euroclear Bank. Yannic Weber, managing director and head of the commercial division, will join the Euroclear Bank management committee.

02FEB07: There must be a severe shortage of local talent at BNP Paribas in the UK. Having imported Gail Burke from Australia to become chief operating officer of the securities services business in the UK, the bank has now gone to New Zealand to find a new head of fund accounting for its Glasgow operation.

Jennifer Bertie will assume responsibility in April for BNP Paribas’ fund accounting operations in Glasgow. She will report to Margaret Lees, head of UK fund accounting and administration. She will be relocating from Wellington, where she is currently head of BNP Paribas’ New Zealand branch. Prior to working at BNP Paribas, she spent over three years at AXA in New Zealand, where she was responsible for investment operations.

01FEB07: Bill Smith has joined JPMorgan Worldwide Securities Services as a managing director to head Western Hemisphere new business development for the firm’s securities lending and execution products unit. Smith will be based in New York and will report to Paul Wilson, recently appointed as global client and sales executive of the unit.

31JAN07: Jemma Broadgate, one of the most successful pension fund sales managers in the UK, has quit her job as head of UK and Ireland pension fund sales at Northern Trust to join JPMorgan in London. She is to work in the European pension fund team under Benjie Fraser, who joined JPMorgan from The Bank of New York last February to run the European pension fund business development team. Broadgate was at Northern Trust for 10 years.

31JAN07: RBC Dexia has announced some management changes:

Robert Manderscheid joins as an advisory member of the executive committee. In his new role, he will be head of sales and relationship management for continental Europe, and will have a functional reporting line to Tony Johnson, global head, sales and relationship management. He joins from Standard & Poor’s in Paris where he was in charge of the overall management of S&P's relationships with the largest corporations in the CAC 40. From 1998 to 2004, he was first vice president at ABN AMRO Mellon Bank, responsible for sales in continental Europe.

Yves Lahaye joins as a member of the executive committee. He will be head of business support, a newly created function, and will be responsible for back office, reconciliation, facilities management, best practices, and, after a provisional period, PMO activities. Lahaye has spent most of his career within Dexia BIL, Luxembourg, where he held various positions in corporate finance, risk management, web banking and private banking. Before taking on this new role, he was head of operational services at Dexia BIL.

Christopher Stuart Sinclair has been promoted to member of the executive committee. He will continue as head of services delivery for Luxembourg. Before joining RBC Dexia in September 2006, he was chief operating officer of State Street Bank Luxembourg.

30JAN07: The USD650m NM Rothschild & Sons Pension Fund has appointed State Street to provide investment services. NM Rothschild & Sons Ltd. provides corporate and resource banking, investment banking, private banking and trust services.

State Street will provide the fund with custody, investment accounting and securities lending services. The new mandate, which will be supported from State Street’s service centre in Edinburgh, builds upon an existing relationship the fund has with WM Performance Services, the European performance measurement division of State Street. The fund was advised by Watson Wyatt.

29JAN07: BNP Paribas Securities Services has appointed Ian Rae as head of UK retail operations. Reporting to Gail Burke, chief operating officer, Rae will be responsible for running the retail operations business in Peterborough. He replaces Martin Ratcliffe, who has been moved to a new role in London. Rae was most recently the director of service delivery for the fund merger programme at Norwich Union.

29JAN07: Fortis has appointed Michael Hofmann as managing director for brokerage, clearing and custody in its Frankfurt branch. Prior to joining Fortis, Hofmann worked for a number of German and American technology firms in Europe and the US, as well as having held a number of positions in the German banking and exchange industry. Hofmann will replace Jürgen Lippert, who will be pursuing new challenges within Prime Fund Solutions Cayman Islands.

29JAN07: BNP Paribas Securities Services in Frankfurt has appointed Renate Hartmann as a sales manager for institutional investors, focusing on pension funds and insurance companies. She reports to Ingo Biermann, who is head of coverage in Frankfurt. She joins from Deutsche Bank.

25JAN07: Mellon has appointed Dean Handley as head of sales within its asset servicing business. Handley was first vice president at ABN AMRO Mellon Global Securities Services where he was responsible for sales to the UK and Ireland financial institution and pension fund sectors. In his new role, Handley will run the sales team responsible for the distribution of Mellon's asset servicing capabilities. Handley will report to Paul North, head of business development for Mellon's international asset servicing business, and will be based in London.

25JAN07: ABN AMRO Mellon has appointed John Matthews as securities lending client service manager. Matthews joins the bank from BGI, where he was product manager, fixed income lending, and will report to Mark Tidy, securities lending product manager.

25JAN07: Mellon has been selected by United Technologies Corporation, a US-based provider of high-technology products and support services to the aerospace and building systems industries, to provide trust and custody, cash management, performance measurement and analytics, and securities lending for the company's USD16.3bn pension plan.

“Mellon has developed a highly sophisticated system that is user friendly and provides the type of reporting that we require,” said Robin Diamonte, chief investment officer of United Technologies. “Also, the depth and experience of Mellon's asset servicing team was highly impressive.”

23JAN07: Northern Trust and the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation have entered into exclusive negotiations for the mandate to act as custodian for the NZD11.5bn (cUSD8bn) New Zealand Superannuation Fund.

The NZSF is an investment fund that accumulates and invests government contributions. It was set up in 2001 for the partial provision of the future cost of retirement and is expected to grow to around NZD109 billion (approximately USD76bn) by 2025. Northern Trust will assume custodial responsibilities for the Fund’s assets on 1st July, 2007. BNP Paribas, which won the mandate in 2003, is the outgoing custodian.

“The review process was comprehensive and competitive,” said David May, chairman of the board of the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation. “Our key aims were to re-examine the best available custody services in the light of the fund’s planned growth and development. We are confident that the services provided by Northern Trust will provide the fund with a robust, independent global custody service that meets international best practice standards.”

23JAN07: Following the recent announcement by the UK’s Universities Superannuation Scheme that it had appointed ABN AMRO Mellon as custodian for its externally managed assets of cGBP5bn, the scheme has reconfirmed JPMorgan as global custodian for its internally managed assets. This covers about GBP24bn. JPMorgan, and Chase, have worked for USS since 1995.

23JAN07: Northern Trust and Insight Investment have successfully migrated Insight’s investment operations to the Northern Trust platform, for over 600 portfolios, representing approximately USD190bn (GBP100bn) in assets under management. Northern Trust provides Insight with every aspect of post trade execution support including trade processing and settlement, data management, reconciliation, portfolio recordkeeping, client valuations and reporting, and performance measurement and attribution.

“This has been an incredibly well performed exercise,” said Atul Manek, chief operating officer at Insight. “It is one of only very few projects of this type and magnitude that has been successfully completed, particularly in the timeframe achieved here.”

23JAN07: State Street has agreed to acquire Currenex, an independently owned online foreign exchange trading platform. Currenex is a market leader in the active-trading segment of the foreign exchange market, serving banks, corporations, hedge funds and other active trading firms. Under the terms of the agreement, State Street will acquire Currenex for approximately USD564m, which will be paid in cash. State Street expects the transaction to be neutral to 2007 results and slightly accretive to earnings in 2008. State Street's FX Connect is the leading institutional electronic foreign exchange trading platform. In December 2006, FX Connect exceeded USD108bn in a single day's trading volume.

19JAN07: One of the longest-running reviews has finally concluded, with the UK’s Universities Superannuation Scheme Limited (USS) appointing ABN AMRO Mellon to provide global custody, cash management and securities lending for the scheme’s externally managed assets, valued at GBP5bn. USS is one of the UK’s largest private sector pension schemes with over 390 participating institutions.

USS originally initiated a review of all its custody arrangements in 2005. The project was subsequently put on hold in early 2006 during a major evaluation of investment strategy. Following that review, the custody RFP process was resurrected, with Thomas Murray acting as consultants. The review process included a detailed due diligence session at Mellon’ UK headquarters by the USS team. State Street is the outgoing custodian.

Significantly, USS stressed that it had received assurances about the ramifications of Mellon’s proposed merger with The Bank of New York, which will undoubtedly lead to some systems being ditched. Colin Hunter, chief financial officer of USS, said: “In addition to its reputation within the UK pensions sector for client service, we were impressed with the Mellon technology platforms and particularly attracted to their securities lending capabilities. ABN AMRO Mellon’s capabilities in the specialised area of lending auctions were a key determining factor in their appointment. We were also happy with the assurances that were given to us regarding the impact of The Bank of New York-Mellon merger.”

19JAN07: Three new hires for RBC Dexia Investor Services:

Brigitte Simard has joined as a director, relationship management in the company's Montreal office. She was previously with IBM Global Services, where she was practice leader of client relationship management and customer experience.

Guy Mettrick has joined as director, business development in the company's London office. He has worked for Pegasystems, The London Stock Exchange and Hambros Bank.

José Santamaria has joined as director, relationship management in the company's London office. He moves from RBC Global Private Banking in the Channel Islands where he was head of institutional sales and business development with responsibility for business development, strategic planning, sales and relationship management.

19JAN07: The big US custodians have all reported significant rises in assets under custody during 2006, with the pecking order now looking like this:

19JAN07: Citigroup has made a major breakthrough in Canada, eighteen months after its acquisition of Unisen, the transfer agency business. It has been selected by Chou Associates Management Inc. to provide global custody, fund valuation and recordkeeping services. This appointment marks the first client for Citigroup’s recently launched ‘global window’ in Canada.

Francis Chou, CEO of Chou Associates Management Inc., said: “Following our rigorous review of service providers, we selected Citigroup because it can provide exactly what we in the Canadian marketplace are seeking: a full-services suite of global custody, fund valuation and recordkeeping.” Chou Associates manages a family of five mutual funds with over CAD1bn assets under management.

19JAN07: Mellon Analytical Solutions has named Allison Langley as head of client relationship management in Europe. Langley will report to Lawrence Langenhan, head of client relations within Mellon’s asset servicing business development team. Langley has held several senior positions within Mellon Analytical Solutions over the last 16 years in sales, product and relationship management.

18JAN07: Brown Brothers Harriman has hired Sébastien Chaker as vice president and head of funds solutions business development in Europe. Chaker will report to Jeff Holland. The position is based in London. Chaker joins BBH from Euroclear, where he was most recently a director in the investment funds product management division, with primary responsibility for defining and implementing Euroclear's global funds strategy. His appointment follows BBH's November hiring of Simon Cleary as senior vice president and head of funds solutions in Europe.

18JAN07: BNP Paribas Securities Services is to set up a new Authorised Corporate Director capability to host, sponsor and administer all forms of collective investment schemes in the UK. Martin Ratcliffe, currently head of retail operations in Peterborough, will be general manager and director. Based in London, he will report to Sue Price, head of transfer agency and retail products UK.

17JAN07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by Abbey, a UK bank, to act as fund administrator, transfer agent, trustee and global custodian for the Abbey Liquidity Fund plc. The fund is based in Dublin and was launched with GBP4bn of assets under management. BNY was appointed as global custodian for a GBP30bn mandate from Abbey National Asset Management in 2005.

17JAN07: Northern Trust has been appointed to provide custody and investment services for The Texas A&M Foundation, which directs fund-raising activities and provides asset management services for Texas A&M University. Services for the USD808m fund include securities lending, performance measurement and risk analytics, including private equity analysis and pooled fund transparency. In addition, Northern Trust Global Investments has been selected to manage a USD70m enhanced cash investment portfolio for the foundation.

17JAN07: John Morris is to stand down from his role as head of UK trustee and depositary services at ABN AMRO Mellon. Steve James, who joined in 2004 from Citigroup, will replace him. ABN AMRO Mellon says that the business now has 10 clients.

15JAN07: Hampshire County Council, a UK local authority, has appointed Northern Trust as its first global custodian, providing custody, performance measurement and securities lending services for the GBP2.8bn pension fund. In addition, Northern Trust Global Investments, the asset management arm of Northern Trust, has been appointed as transition manager. Northern Trust claims to service about one-third of the UK’s local authority sector.

11JAN07: Further movement in the derivatives space as custodians grapple with the challenges of pricing OTC instruments. Mellon has introduced an independent OTC derivatives valuation service for a wide range of swaps and options for institutional clients. Mellon will provide these valuations through third party vendors.

Mellon says that providing services to support derivatives trading is a strategic area of focus. Additional developments planned throughout the next 18 months include enhanced derivatives reporting, transaction processing, and risk and collateral management.

10JAN07: The Bank of New York has been appointed by the William T. Grant Foundation to provide master custody and risk monitoring services.

10JAN07: MFS Investment Management has selected JPMorgan to provide custody, fund accounting and securities lending services for a portion of its assets under management.

09JAN07: Northern Trust announced has been appointed custodian for the El Paso Firemen and Policemen’s Pension Fund, providing global custody, securities lending, benefits payment and foreign exchange services for the USD600m fund.

“After an extensive provider evaluation process, Northern Trust stood out because of their superior client service and competitive pricing,” said Robert Stanton, executive director of the El Paso Firemen and Policemen’s Pension Fund.

09JAN07: HM Capital Partners LLC, a private equity investment management firm, has selected JPMorgan Private Equity Fund Services to provide a full suite of fund administration services for the firm’s portfolio of funds, representing more than USD10bn in committed capital. The five fund accountants in the HM Capital fund administration team will transfer to JPMorgan.

JPMorgan will manage and support various processes including fund accounting, investor tracking, waterfall administration, tax support services and financial reporting requirements.

Based in Dallas, HM Capital is the successor firm to Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst Incorporated, and is currently investing and managing its USD1.6bn fund and the remaining Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst Incorporated portfolio of funds.

08JAN07: Société Générale Securities Services has strengthened its Athens custody hub as a result of the establishment of a joint trading platform between the Cyprus Stock Exchange and the Athens Stock Exchange. It has also expanded its agent bank services offered to the Cyprus Stock Exchange.

The Athens regional custody hub offers a single entry point into Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Hungary, Cyprus, Turkey and Egypt. These countries are now accessible through a single euro-denominated entry point with consolidated asset reporting.