Euromoney, is part of the Delinian Group, Delinian Limited, 4 Bouverie Street, London, EC4Y 8AX, Registered in England & Wales, Company number 00954730
Copyright © Delinian Limited and its affiliated companies 2024
Accessibility | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Modern Slavery Statement

Citi

  • Asset managers and industry regulators face operational challenges around the tokenization of private assets.
  • Luring star bankers from rivals – like Citi’s appointment of JPMorgan veteran Viswas Raghavan – can bring hidden costs beyond the expense of replacing stock options for the lucky new hire.
  • Leading commercial banks are focusing on their approach to relationship management to reassure corporate customers that they are being listened to.
  • Chief executive Jane Fraser has been true to her promise of a marquee hire to run Citi’s banking division, with the appointment today of JPMorgan veteran Viswas Raghavan. He brings a wealth of both transactional and operational management experience, but the symbolism of his arrival may be just as important.
  • One of the first edicts handed down by Citi’s wealth head is to tell all private bankers to track and record client calls. It has ruffled feathers at the US lender, but if it transforms the unit into the powerhouse CEO Jane Fraser wants it to be, then so be it.
  • No industry will be more overwhelmingly affected by new forms of artificial intelligence – both generative-AI and other technology to come – than banking. Costly but cost-effective, it is up to banks to make AI work for them, not the other way around.
  • Citi’s head of Asia treasury and trade solutions has retired after 40 years at the US bank. He tells Euromoney what he would do if he were a 20-something graduate today, and why it helps to be both a specialist and a jack-of-all-trades in the industry now.
  • They already dominate the investment banking business in Europe, and now the leading US banks have their eyes on an even bigger prize. They see their vast investments in the digital technology transforming payments and transaction services and their retained global presences as the keys to winning even greater revenues from Europe’s midsize corporates.
  • The World Bank is issuing ‘outcomes’ bond structures for niche sustainability themes and with new financing mechanisms. Like blue bonds, they are probably going to need some rule-setting.
  • The annual Senate quizzing of US big bank chief executives threw up all the usual favourite partisan arguments, but little else. If this is oversight, it often lacks insight.
  • Andy Sieg is back again from Merrill Lynch, and has big plans for Citi’s new global wealth franchise.
  • Jane Fraser, chief executive of Citi since March 2021, has a mighty task on her hands. Like so many of her predecessors, she faces the puzzle of how to articulate an identity for a bank that always seems to be trying to do too much at once. So far, she has focused on redefining the scope of the firm and most recently on adapting its structure to fit that. The hardest part – fixing the bank’s woeful returns – is still to come.
  • ESG
    Big banks are scrutinized on environmental, social and governance matters today as never before and they must often walk a tightrope between competing interests. Citi is no exception.
  • Exiting consumer banking in a range of markets around the world was one of Jane Fraser's first steps when she became Citi’s chief executive. The immensely complex task would need the safest of hands.
  • As Citi presses on with its consumer-banking exits around the world, the job of defining what its international network now represents falls to its newly appointed head of international, Ernesto Torres Cantú.
  • Execution is key to Fraser’s grand plan.
  • Citi’s sale of its China consumer wealth portfolio to HSBC for $3.6 billion is a nuanced tale of two banks with increasingly different strategies. As HSBC tilts ever more toward Asia, Citi proves ever more inclined to see all financial services through a global prism.
  • A Citi survey of family offices finds some unsurprising things to say about the worries of the wealthy – inflation, interest rates and geopolitics – but discovers a shocking lack of preparation for succession planning.
  • Securities finance practitioners are taking a mix of approaches to managing cash, funding and liquidity in a shortened settlement cycle.
  • Awards for Excellence
    It is tempting to conclude that Citi’s impressive suite of treasury management services, for which it wins the award of Latin America’s best bank for transaction services, is the result of the bank knowing that it really needs to excel in this area. Given the growth strategy being pursued by chief executive Jane Fraser, which has seen the bank pull out of many retail banking markets to focus on corporate and investment banking, a market-leading transaction services offering is imperative.
  • Awards for Excellence
    If an organization in Latin America – corporate, sovereign or multilateral – wants to raise finance, Citi will invariably be part of the conversation. The bank’s financing team, led by Adrian Guzzoni, head of debt capital markets for Latin America, and Marcelo Millen, head of equity capital markets for Latin America, has shown that Citi’s ability to access local and international sources of funding and to present options spanning debt, loans and equity is a compelling proposition for finance departments across the region.
  • Awards for Excellence
    The retrenchment that Citi has made in the retail markets of central America has clearly not impacted its dominance of corporate and investment banking in the region. It wins the award for central America’s best investment bank again this year.
  • Awards for Excellence
    With the war in Ukraine adding to global volatility in capital markets, investment banking deal flow was weak in central and eastern Europe during 2022 and early 2023, especially for lower-rated names.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Citi takes everything it does seriously, but there is a special place in its collective consciousness for transaction services. This often-sprawling area of financial services, which chief executive Jane Fraser calls the crown jewel of the bank, is the beating heart of all Citi stands for.
  • Awards for Excellence
    In investment banking, Citi continues to benefit from the combination of a leading global network and an on the ground presence in Africa that is much bigger than most other international firms.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Evidence of an ability to leverage networks across Africa and beyond has helped Citi win the title of Africa’s best bank for advisory this year. While the firm has a strong franchise in South Africa, the rest of the continent is now becoming more important as a growth market. This award is therefore largely thanks to the team led by chairman of investment banking for Middle East and Africa, Miguel Azevedo, and Claude-Stephanie Ngningha, Citi’s head of investment banking in Africa outside South Africa and Egypt.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Citi’s transaction services bankers can be in no doubt of the firm’s commitment to their business. Chief executive Jane Fraser is on record calling the Treasury and Trade Solutions (TTS) division the crown jewel of the bank and she rarely misses an opportunity to refer to it. The bank invested $1 billion in technology for this business alone in 2022.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Citi’s refocused strategy is bearing fruit as growing corporate balance sheets position it for business.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Citi’s crown jewels sparkle in a record-breaking year for the business.
  • Awards for Excellence
    Citi’s securities services business has put in an excellent year both in terms of new business and digital innovation.