Citi Singapore to shut consumer unit serving small businesses in August

CITI is closing its Citibusiness unit, which serves small businesses under its consumer banking franchise in Singapore, from mid-August, the bank told The Business Times on Monday.

BT understands that about 20 to 30 staff will be impacted from the closure. The bank will focus on redeploying and assisting staff to get re-established as soon as possible by collaborating with various support agencies to conduct career coaching, change management workshops and more.

"Following ongoing strategic reviews of our plans for our small business banking in Singapore, we will be re-allocating these resources and our people to support other growth areas and sharpen our client focus," a Citi spokesperson told BT.

Citibusiness is a small unit under the bank's consumer banking division in Singapore that serves "very small-sized" businesses, BT understands.

The bank will continue to serve its small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) clients through Citi Commercial Bank, which is part of the institutional side of its franchise.

"Singapore is a priority market for Citi. We continue to invest and focus on growth areas of the bank including the SME and commercial banking business," said the spokesperson.

About 2,000 customers have been told that their deposit accounts will be closed with effect from Aug 11, and were advised to transfer their balances before then, as reported by The Straits Times on Monday.

This move comes after the Wall Street giant made a call in April to exit its consumer business in 13 markets, including China and India, citing the lack of scale needed to compete as well as a stronger focus on wealth management.

Singapore is one of Citi's remaining four wealth hubs. It expects to hire up to 1,500 staff for its consumer wealth businesses in Singapore to support plans to triple its assets under management by 2025.