Concept
A custodian bank, or simply custodian, is a specialized financial institution responsible for providing securities services. It provides post-trade services and solutions for asset owners (e.g. sovereign wealth funds, central banks, insurance companies), asset managers, banks and broker-dealers. It is not engaged in "traditional" commercial or consumer/retail banking like lending. In the past, the custodian bank purely focused on custody, safekeeping, settlement, and administration of securities as well as asset servicing such as income collection and corporate actions. Yet, in the modern financial world, custodian banks have started providing a wider range of value-adding or cost-saving financial services, ranging from fund administration to transfer agency, from securities lending to trustee services. Custodian banks are often referred to as global custodians if they safe keep assets for their clients in multiple jurisdictions around the world, using their own local branches or other local custodian banks ("sub-custodian" or "agent banks") with which they contract to be in their "global network" in each market to hold accounts for their respective clients. Assets held in such a manner are typically owned by larger institutional firms with a considerable number of investments such as banks, insurance companies, mutual funds, hedge funds and pension funds. In 1961, U.S. President John F. Kennedy established a Committee on Corporate Pension Plans. 2 years later, Studebaker Auto Manufacturer shuttered its business and operations, and it failed to provide pensions to the approximately 7,000 employees affected. Hence, in 1974, U.S. President Gerald Ford proposed an Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA Act), protecting the employee benefit plans' standards. Since the Act has become effective, employers could not hold and keep their pension fund assets. Instead, they are obligated to appoint external custodians to safekeep the assets.
