State Street Global Markets Global Markets is State Street's securities business that offers research, trading, and securities lending services for foreign exchange, stocks, fixed income, and derivatives. To avoid a conflict of interest, the company does not run proprietary trading books. Global Markets maintains trading desks in Boston, London, Sydney, Toronto, and Tokyo. History The company traces its roots to Union Bank, which received a charter in 1792 from Massachusetts Governor John Hancock. It was the third bank to be chartered in Boston and its office was at the corner of State and Exchange Streets. In 1865, Union Bank received a national charter and became the National Union Bank of Boston. The bank later built a headquarters at Washington and State streets. State Street Deposit & Trust Co opened in July 1891. The name was shortened to State Street Trust Company in 1897. It became the custodian of the first U.S. mutual fund in 1924, the Massachusetts Investors Trust (now MFS Investment Management). 20th century State Street and National Union merged in October 1925. The merged bank took the State Street name, but National Union was the nominal survivor, and it operated under National Union's charter, thus giving the current entity its rank among the oldest banks in the United States. The company merged with Second National Bank in 1955 and with the Rockland-Atlas National Bank in 1961. In 1966, the company completed construction of the State Street Bank Building, a new headquarters building, the first high-rise office tower in downtown Boston. In 1972, the company opened its first international office in Munich. In 1973, as a 50/50 joint venture with DST Systems, the company formed Boston Financial Data Services, a provider of shareholder record-keeping, intermediary and investor services, and regulatory compliance. More than 100 top staff from IBM were hired by State Street as it set about implementing IBM mainframe computer systems. In 1975, William Edgerly became president and chief executive officer of the bank and shifted the company's strategy from commercial banking to investments and securities processing. During the 1980s and 1990s, the company opened offices in Montreal, Toronto, Dublin, London, Paris, Dubai, Sydney, Wellington, Hong Kong, and Tokyo. By 1992, most of State Street's revenue came from fees for holding securities, settling trades, keeping records, and performing accounting. In 1994, the company formed State Street Global Advisors, a global asset management business. In 1995, State Street acquired