Citi Forms Risk Management Group

Citigroup announced that Brian Leach will assume the role of chief risk officer, reporting to Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit. Leach will also become acting chief risk officer for the institutional clients group. The company also named four new senior managers to the risk unit — Suneel Bakhshi , Charles Monet, Greg Hawkins and Adil Nathani — who will all be reporting to Leach. In his new role, Leach will work closely with Pandit heading up the bank’s efforts to manage and track all risks undertaken by Citi. He will also lead the efforts to set strategic risk parameters and will play a significant role in capital allocation to make sure that Citi takes advantage of growth opportunities that meet appropriate risk-return standards. Meanwhile, Jorge Bermudez has retired. Over the last three months, Bermudez has worked closely with senior management to assess and develop a plan for the risk function. Citi also said that Bakhshi has been appointed at chief risk officer of the global consumer group and for Citibank N.A. In his new role, Bakhshi will focus on managing risk, including market, credit and operational risks, in these units. Monet will lead the risk oversight of capital allocation. He currently serves as an advisor to the co-chairmen of the Basel subcommittee defining regulatory capital requirements for default risk in banks’ trading books. Hawkins will assume responsibility for risk oversight of real estate and mortgage exposure. Hawkins was an assistant professor in finance at the business school of the University of California, Berkeley. He joined Salomon Brothers in 1985, beginning in mortgage research and later becoming managing director and co-head of U.S. fixed income arbitrage. Nathani assumes responsibility for risk oversight of structured credit. He is a managing director as well as a member of Old Lane’s fixed income team. Previously, he served as managing director, group executive and a board member at IXIS Capital Markets, where he also ran various units, including securitization and finance and structured credit products, among others. Before this, Nathani spent several years managing fixed income assets at Smith Breeden Associates, Ambac and Normandy Asset Management. Leach is currently the chief risk officer and co-chief operating officer of Old Lane. Before co-founding Old Lane, Leach worked his entire financial career at Morgan Stanley, most recently as risk manager of the institutional securities business. — ASR Staff