Wells Fargo & Co. announced Monday that it had completed its acquisition of the mutual fund company Strong Financial Corp.
Adding Strong's $29 billion of assets under management makes Wells one of the nation's 20 largest mutual fund companies. The deal, announced in May, includes $24 billion of mutual fund assets and $5 billion of institutional investment accounts. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
San Francisco-based Wells had $627 billion of assets under management and administration at Sept. 30. The deal's closing puts assets under management and administration at about $656 billion, including $100 billion of mutual fund assets under management.
Strong offered mutual funds to individual investors and accounts for institutional clients. Its businesses include about 775,000 active accounts serving 370,000 households. The Strong portfolios included in the purchase are to be reorganized into the Wells Fargo Funds family in the second quarter, bringing the banking company's fund lineup to 120 portfolios.
The purchase also includes the assets of Strong's retirement plan services business, which is becoming part of Wells Fargo's institutional trust services group. Wells Fargo's private-client services group has bought most of the retail brokerage accounts formerly offered through Strong and is to incorporate them into Wells Fargo Investments LLC in the second quarter. In addition, Wisconsin, the state where Strong was headquartered, has appointed Wells its program manager for the EdVest and Tomorrow's Scholar college 529 savings programs.
With the completion of the acquisition, most of Strong Financial's portfolio managers have joined Wells Capital Management, an investment management subsidiary of the banking company. These managers are to remain in their present offices.
