Citibank to expand commercial banking services to Nigeria, others

American financial service group, Citigroup Inc., has announced the commencement of the expansion of its commercial banking services to Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya and Egypt to take advantage of the presence of international businesses in these countries.

This is coming several months after the banking group announced its exit from consumer and retail banking in 13 markets across Asia, Europe and Middle East.

According to Bloomberg, this was made known by Citigroup’s Chief Executive Officer for Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) emerging markets cluster, Ebru Pakcan, during an interview in Dubai.

However, this push into the country is coming up barely some weeks after the British banking and financial services group, Standard Chartered announced that its Nigerian subsidiary will close about 50% of its branches as it navigates towards digital banking to improve customer service.

Citibank’s expansion into some of the biggest economic hubs in the African continent is also in line with the bank’s activities in countries like Australia, where it set up a commercial banking business in 2019.

The bank under its Chief Executive Officer, Jane Fraser, who took over in March 2021, has been seriously reviewing its consumer banking operations in markets across the globe, existing in 13 different countries, although it stated that it will continue to offer products to larger clients and institutions in these markets.

Also, the Citibank Group in January 2022, announced its exit from consumer, small business and middle market banking units in its Mexico subsidiary by June, ending its 20-year retail presence in the country that was the last of its overseas consumer businesses.

The bank’s decision to sell its Mexican asset is part of chief executive Jane Fraser’s strategy to bring Citigroup’s profitability and share price performance in line with its peers.

The US banking and financial group intends to focus on its rapidly expanding wealth management arm and hopes to deepen its presence in Africa by leveraging on relationships built elsewhere.

Pakcan said, “We will be in the markets with a caveat that we are not going to go to very low or small enterprises but rather focusing on making the Citi network available to existing clients with multiple countries’ presence.

“We are working on the strategy to develop wealth in the UAE,” Pakcan said. “We are talking about building space and planning around where to seat the new hires.”