Lorne SteinbergState Street CorpSTTPAST TOP PICKFeb 01, 2024

Mainly custodial services, long-term compounder. Makes $$ by growing assets under management, which have grown over time, but growth not great. SPDR ETF business, decent size and growing nicely. His issue is that its worth is based on market values, less on market activity, and market valuations are up there.

He's been trimming banks in US and Canada.

Recent huge acquisition in Japan. Huge economies of scale. Steady grower. Fees come down or rebound along with markets. Still very cheap. Very well-capitalized balance sheet.

Financial services category, but in reality is a "custodian" of security transactions. Very stable business with lots of opportunity. Margins and profits continue to rise. Weakness after Silicon Valley collapse has created buying opportunity. Recent inclusion in US "Fed Test" indicated large amount of excess capital. Expecting large divided payout soon. 

They bought back 13.2% of shares this year. That's good, but STT lost market share to Blackrock in ETFs and that's not good. The lesson: big share buybacks doesn't alone mean a stock is a buy. The underlying business has to be sound too.