Citi consolidates wealth businesses

Citi has unified the wealth teams from its global consumer banking and its institutional clients group to form a new wealth unit, Citi Global Wealth.

The single integrated platform now includes Citi Private Bank and Citi Personal Wealth Management businesses. 

Citi Private Bank serves more than 13,000 ultra-high-net-worth clients, with around US$550 billion ($714 billion) in total client business. The group reported that its clients now include 25 per cent of the world’s billionaires and more than 1,400 family offices in more than 100 countries. 

Citi’s global head of investor sales and relationship management, Jim O’Donnell, will lead the new wealth division, reporting to Anand Selva, chief executive of global consumer banking and Paco Ybarra, CEO of the institutional clients group. 

In an internal memo, Citi CEO Michael Corbat and president and incoming chief Jane Fraser commented: “Making wealth management a key differentiator and source of enhanced returns for Citi will be an important element of our strategy going forward, and putting the full force of our firm behind an offering in this way is indicative of the approach we’re taking to transforming our bank.”

The new head of Citi Global Wealth, Mr O’Donnell, added: “Our clients are increasingly global in their presence and in their financial needs, and we are committed to helping them preserve and build wealth for themselves, their families and for future generations.

“Creating a unified wealth organisation will help us to deliver the full, global power of Citi to clients while ensuring that we preserve the products, capabilities and expertise of the Private Bank and Consumer Wealth businesses,” Mr O’Donnell concluded.

Mr O’Donnell has been with Citi since 1999, having been responsible for the distribution of global markets products to the company’s equities, fixed income, currencies and commodities clients in his last role. 

[Related: Citi earnings plunge with COVID onslaught]