Chase Manhattan to Acquire Three U.S. Trust Corp. Units

Chase Manhattan Corp. agreed Friday to acquire the securities-processing business of U.S. Trust Corp. for $363.5 million in stock.

The move makes Chase the world’s largest processor of securities transactions, which involves handling paperwork, settling trades, sending information to shareholders and other accounting and administrative tasks.

The acquisition will give Chase, already a major processor, responsibility for handling $1.8 trillion inassets held by mutual funds, corporations, pension funds, endowments and foundations after the acquisition.

Chase, based in New York, will take over three U.S. Trust units--one provides services to mutual funds, another targets 300 corporate clients and the third deals with unit investment trusts, which are investments that pay a steady stream of income.

Prior to the sale, U.S. Trust, a New York-based investment management firm with $32 billion in assets, will spin off its remaining businesses--asset management, corporate trust services and banking for wealthy clients--to its shareholders. This way, U.S. Trust can sell what’s left to Chase in an exchange of stock only in a tax-free structure.

U.S. Trust shareholders will receive stock in the new company on a share-for-share basis, the company said.

The bank expects the operations, which will be merged with Chase’s by June, 1995, to add $4 million to next year’s profits, and to earn $22 million by 1996 and $49 million a year by 2000.

Of U.S. Trust’s 2,700 employees, 1,150 in New York and Boston will be move over to Chase. About 200 staffers will lose their jobs when the two companies consolidate operations, U.S. Trust said.