Citi’s off-season risk hires show how it fears regulators
After the huge fines that Citi paid to both the SEC in the US and the FCA in the UK, it seems the bank is seriously upping its risk staff.
Citi paid £12.6m ($14.8m) to the FCA for “failing to properly implement the Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) trade surveillance requirements relating to the detection of market abuse.”
The fine pales in comparison, however, to the SEC’s $400m for the deficiencies in their risk management systems that culminated in the bank sending just shy of $1bn to creditors… By mistake.
In an earnings call with investors after announcing Q3 results, Citi’s CFO Mark Mason noted that Citi’s 8% increase in expenses – of nearly $1bn – was driven in large part by “transformation investments, with about two-thirds related to the risk, controls, data and finance programs.”
Another 25% of transformation investment came from technology – and Mason said that the bank had 10,000 people dedicated “to that transformation.” Citi had over 220,000 employees as per its latest annual report.
One of the bank’s highlight risk additions has been Oliver Lambert. He joined Citi this month as head of strategic risk after spending over 12 years at EY, where he was an MD.
He joins Myrna Infante, who joined Citi as an MD in July after nearly 6 years at UBS. She is Citi’s head of KYC (Know Your Customer) operations for institutional clients in the EMEA region and spent the bulk of her career – over 17 years – at Morgan Stanley.
Edward Clementi also joined Citi as an MD over the summer, after an 18-year career with Morgan Stanley. He is Citi’s global head of ICG (institutional clients group), risk and control.
A search of Citi’s job page shows 16 results for a “Managing Director” in the “Risk Management” category, including for an APAC ICG risk and control head, reporting to global head Clementi.
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