State Street has sold Swiss data and analysis firm Complementa Investment Controlling to its management.

Complementa CEO Heinz B. Rothacher has bought the company, based in St Gallen, plus its branch in Zurich and German subsidiary in Frankfurt.

The formerly independent Swiss advisory was sold by its founder Michael Brandenberger to State Street in 2011. 

“State Street has reviewed its strategy and only wants to provide investment reporting and analytics services to clients who have a depot with them,” Rothacher told IPE.

A spokeswoman for State Street said the decision to sell Complementa “reflects the strategy to focus on the delivery of our core services to our asset servicing clients”.

She added: “We will continue to offer performance measurement services to our asset servicing clients as part of a fully-integrated solution and remain committed to the region.”

Rothacher bought 100% of the shares in Complementa plus it subsidiaries and will keep the name, he said.

Rothacher will take on most of the 90 members of staff at Complementa and the management board. Only 14 will remain with State Street. The new structure will come into effect from 1 December.

“Both our clients as well as the staff have welcomed that we will become an independent company once again,” said Rothacher.

He confirmed Complementa will continue to cooperate with State Street, but emphasised that independent collection of data was key for services such as its annual risk check-up.

“For our clients our independence means we become a second layer of control,” says Rothacher, who also sees “good chances” for the “new” Complementa in the Swiss and German institutional markets.

“It is also easier for us as a consultancy to no longer be part of a banking group because we had to adhere to all their compliance regulation which actually did not apply to us,” noted Rothacher. 

He stressed the company was striving for continuity and least possible disruption to the clients.

Meanwhile, Allocare – which provides Complementa’s reporting system – was also externalised in a separate management buyout.

Topics