Citigroup Inc will transfer as many as 200 investment banking staff to Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc as part of the Japanese bank’s acquisition of securities units in Tokyo, two people familiar with the situation said.
Investment bankers and equity and debt capital markets employees from Nikko Citigroup Ltd will be part of the transfer, which will account for as much as 20 percent of staff at the unit, said the people, who declined to be named as they are not authorized to discuss it publicly.
The move will take place on Oct. 1, they said.
Citigroup, which agreed in May to sell retail brokerage Nikko Cordial Securities Inc and parts of its equity and bond underwriting at Nikko Citigroup, has not announced any details about which investment banking staff, and how many, will move.
The New York-based bank, which was rescued by the US government last year, is selling securities businesses in Japan to Sumitomo Mitsui for ¥545 billion (US$5.7 billion) as part of a global reorganization.
The employees who will move to Sumitomo Mitsui include bankers covering technology, energy and consumer industries, the people said.
Those covering financial institutions and private equity will remain with Citigroup, they said.
Chika Togawa, a spokeswoman for Tokyo-based Sumitomo Mitsui, Japan’s second-biggest bank by market value, said in a faxed statement that the company will acquire the majority of the equity and bond underwriting businesses and a part of investment banking operations. She declined to provide staff numbers.
The US bank will continue equity and debt underwriting businesses and mergers and acquisitions advisory in Japan, they said. Citigroup will announce the details later this month, they said.
Yumiko Iuchi, a Tokyo-based spokeswoman for Citigroup, declined to comment.
Sumitomo Mitsui plans to integrate the Citigroup bankers into the Daiwa Securities SMBC Co investment banking venture, in which it holds a 40 percent stake, the people said. Daiwa Securities Group Inc owns the remainder.
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