Citigroup Hires New Global Head of Prime Finance

By Rob Copeland And Christina Rexrode 

Citigroup Inc. is filling its long-vacant position as global head of prime finance with an executive from UBS AG.

Adam Herrmann, most recently global co-head of equity finance at UBS, will start in June at Citigroup's London offices in the role, which had been empty since David Murphy left in September. He will report to Okan Pekin, Citi's global head of investor services, and eventually move to New York.

A Citigroup spokesman confirmed the appointment. A UBS spokesman didn't have an immediate comment and Mr. Herrmann couldn't be reached.

Prime brokerage includes the lucrative practice of executing and financing trades for hedge funds and is a closely-watched function on Wall Street. But since the financial crisis, new regulations on the use of bank capital have crimped the business. Banks including Citigroup and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. have cut some of their less-profitable clients of late.

Still, it remains a highly-competitive enterprise, in part because prime brokerage clients often use other bank services like private wealth management.

Jenny Strasburg contributed to this article.

Write to Rob Copeland at [e-mail] and Christina Rexrode at [e-mail]

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