BoNY Buys Mellon, Now Biggest Asset Servicer, Trustee

The Bank of New York will pay $16.5 billion to acquire Pittsburgh’s Mellon Financial Corp., creating the largest securities servicing firm and corporate trustee in the world, both firms said today.

The deal—BoNY’s second this year, following its April agreement to swap its consumer banking business for JPMorgan Chase’s corporate trust business—creates a giant which will compete for hedge funds’ securities lending, servicing and trusteeship business.