About This Company

The Irving Trust Company was founded in 1851. Since there was not yet a federal currency, each bank issued its own paper and those institutions with the most appealing names found their certificates more widely accepted. Some banks, such as the Bank of the Metropolis, tried the imposing image. Irving selected another route and named the bank after Washington Irving, an author, diplomat, and lawyer who had gained an international reputation as America's first man of letters. His portrait appeared on the bank's notes and contributed to their wide appeal.

By the turn of the century, Irving began to acquire nine of the city's many banking institutions such as the New York Exchange Bank in 1912 and the Mercantile National Bank in 1913. Also in that year, it relocated to new quarters in the Woolworth Building, which it occupied until moving to One Wall Street in 1931. Only two other structures are known to have occupied the site at Wall Street and Broadway, one of which by coincidence housed the law offices of Washington Irving. Today, The Bank of New York is the principal subsidiary of The Bank of New York Company, Inc., one of the largest bank holding companies in the United States. With over $4.4 trillion in assets under custody, the bank is one of the largest custodians for institutional and personal assets in the world. It is the leading issuer of American and global depositary receipts with more than a 60% market share and is also the leader in corporate trust, representing over 60,000 issues and more than $600 billion in principal. The bank is a leading stock transfer agent, handling this function for more than 1,200 corporations and 11 million shareholders. The Bank of New York has the largest retail branch network in suburban New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, and it is the largest asset-based lender in Canada, the United Kingdom and the second largest in the United States. It is one of the largest lenders to major American corporations and has a long and distinguished history in the areas of private banking, personal trust and investment management.