Citigroup gets Indian to head investment arm

Citigroup’s embattled chairman and chief executive, Mr Charles O. Prince III, announced a major reorga-nisation and management shake-up last night as questions linger about his ability to run the giant bank. Citigroup announced that it would combine its investment banking and alternative investment units, brin-ging the groups together under one leader. Mr Vikram S. Pandit, a former Morgan Stanley executive who runs Citigroup’s alternative investment division, will lead the new group, to be called institutional client group. Mr Pandit, 50, will oversee two younger executives and will report to Mr Prince.
One of the two executives, Mr James A. Forese, who had been head of global equities, was promoted to co-chief executive of the investment bank and will be responsible for its capital markets activities. The second executive, Mr Michael S. Klein, will remain as a co-chief executive of the investment bank.
A third executive, Mr Thomas G. Maheras, who had shared power with Mr Klein, is leaving the company after a review of the fixed-income trading operations led to the departure of a top lieutenant, Mr Randolph H. Barker. Mr Barker’s partner, Mr Geoffrey O. Coley, was reassigned, given unspecified responsibilities. Much of a $5.9 billion third-quarter write-down that Citigroup announced last week came in fixed-income trading. In a telephone interview, Mr Prince declined to comment on the findings of the review. But he remained upbeat in the face of questions about his ability to guide Citigroup.