Business and Finance Business and Finance
Tue, October 19, 2010
Mon, October 18, 2010

State Street Introduces New Exchange Traded Fund Servicing Capability to Help ETF Providers Streamline ETF Orders


Published on 2010-10-18 07:10:36 - Market Wire
  Print publication without navigation


BOSTON--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT), one of the worlda™s leading providers of financial services to institutional investors, announced today that it has launched a new service for the Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) market to help clients process ETF orders more efficiently and in an automated and streamlined fashion. As ETFs have continued to grow in popularity and in number, the complexity involved in servicing ETFs has increased significantly.

"Our new offering automates the way in which clients handle restricted securities, making it a seamless process with a clear audit trail that facilitates compliance with regulatory requirements."

ETFs currently account for more than $1 trillion in global assets under management and remain an efficient, low-cost, transparent and tax-friendly investment tool. With State Streeta™s Assisted Trading service, authorized participants, typically market makers or specialists who obtain the underlying assets to create ETFs, can simultaneously enter the ETFs they want to trade and identify any restricted shares via State Streeta™s FundConnect platform. Restricted shares are securities that are not eligible for proprietary trading and change daily based on underwriting, mergers, investments and other activities. Previously, the method for identifying restricted shares within ETFs was manual and intensive. Using this capability, the restricted shares are segregated and sent to State Street Global Markets, the companya™s investment research and trading arm, to be traded. This process ensures that the authorized participant is completely in compliance with all regulatory and exchange requirements when trading ETFs.

aSince 1993, State Street has differentiated itself among other ETF service providers through its leading-edge technology, consultative client approach and flexible servicing model to service ETFs,a said Frank Koudelka, senior vice president at State Street Global Services. aOur new offering automates the way in which clients handle restricted securities, making it a seamless process with a clear audit trail that facilitates compliance with regulatory requirements.a

The Assisted Trading service is accessed through FundConnect, State Streeta™s online trading platform for ETFs, which is integrated with State Streeta™s transfer agency recordkeeping platform. The transfer agent releases the approved orders to the ETF accounting platform and the depository via DTCC Fast.

About State Street

State Street Corporation (NYSE: STT) is one of the world's leading providers of financial services to institutional investors including investment servicing, investment management and investment research and trading. With $19 trillion in assets under custody and $1.8 trillion in assets under management at June 30, 2010, State Street operates in 27 countries and more than 100 geographic markets worldwide. For more information, visit State Streeta™s web site at [ www.statestreet.com ].

Contributing Sources