UK – A senior executive at State Street says the bank could make “selective acquisitions” in Europe following its 1.5 billion dollar acquisition of Deutsche Bank’s securities services arm.

There could be “selective acquisitions along the way”, said executive vice president Jay Hooley, who heads the bank’s mutual funds and collective funds servicing business worldwide. He said State Street is watching France and Spain “closely” and that the two countries are “on our horizon”.

The Deutsche Global Securities Services acquisition gave it scale in Germany, Italy and Austria, Hooley told reporters. He stressed that growth through acquisitions was not a strategy in itself.

“Europe is very attractive,” he said. Hooley added that the restructuring of the European pensions system and the opening up of closed distribution systems presents State Street with a “huge opportunity”.

In March, Jeff Conway, State Street’s managing director of investor services in the UK, said the bank wouldn’t rule out a further global custody acquisition as the industry consolidates.

At presentation today, Conway said that “ninety percent plus” of the 1,000 job cuts announced as a result of the GSS acquisition would be in the US.

Conway also said that State Street is reviewing the strategy at WM Co., the performance measurement business it bought as part of the Deutsche deal. He said WM needs to “move up the value chain”.

“We’re focusing on the what and the where,” Conway said, adding the WM had become “boxed-in” under Deutsche. The unit has around 800 clients.

Earlier this month, the Boston-based bank posted what it termed “disappointing” first-quarter earnings, down to 96 million dollars from 178 million dollars the year before; it has announced a total of 2,800 job cuts. Its shares have lost 30% of their value in the past year.

State Street has 7.9 trillion dollars in assets under custody and 788 billion dollars in assets under management. State Street Global Advisors is the ninth largest manager of European pension fund assets.