Dive Brief:
- Citi elevated Jonathan Lofthouse to co-CIO last week, just months after a different executive was named to the position, according to an internal memo seen by Reuters.
- Lofthouse replaces Stuart Riley, a 14-year veteran of Citi who became co-CIO in September.
- Riley is leaving the bank to pursue another opportunity, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg. Riley’s exit is unrelated to the large-scale reorganization Citi is undergoing, which included reductions of roughly 300 senior managers Monday, according to the wire service.
Dive Insight:
The IT leadership reshuffle means Lofthouse will lead the bank’s digital transformation efforts with co-CIO Shadman Zafar.
Citi declined to comment on Lofthouse’s new role, Riley’s departure or how Lofthouse and Zafar will coordinate their roles as co-CIOs.
But “transformation” — Citi’s term for its long-running effort to modernize data architecture and resolve two consent orders from 2020 — has been a driving force at the bank. Citi spent about $3 billion on tech in this year’s third quarter, CFO Mark Mason said last month. And although the bank shed roughly 2,000 positions over that three-month span, its tech hires offset that.
Even before Citi’s reorganization was announced in September, the bank switched up the executive in charge of the transformation.
Citi in March named Anand Selva as its next chief operating officer, making the 32-year veteran the bank’s point person in the effort to bolster risk management, data governance and internal controls.
Selva took over responsibility for its transformation from Karen Peetz, the bank’s chief administrative officer who would retire in May.
As for the personnel moves announced Monday, Citi CEO Jane Fraser said in a memo, “No question, these are the proverbial hard yards.”
“We always knew that changing the trajectory of our bank would not be easy, but I remain as confident as ever about the path we’re on,” Fraser said. “We’re moving at pace to implement these changes so that we can provide colleagues with clarity about their roles and begin to feel the benefits they will deliver.”
As of October, Citi had retired 290 apps, reduced processing time of complex calculations related to stress testing by more than 50% and re-architected approximately half of transactional processes related to prioritized products, according to its third-quarter report.
— Dan Ennis contributed to this report.
