Citi to open Korea desks in Vietnam and Czech Republic

There are seven Korea desks in different locations currently.

Citi Korea has announced that it plans to open more Korea desks this year to provide institutional banking services to Korean multi-national clients in Vietnam and further across Europe.

Currently, Citi Korea is operating Korea desks in seven locations, including Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore, New Delhi, Moscow, London and New York, providing institutional banking services to Korean multi-national clients across Western and Eastern Europe, India, ASEAN, China, North America and Latin America. The bank plans to continuously open more desks to serve Korean companies in key countries where they operate.

Here's more from Citi's announcement:

The new Korea desks to be opened include one in Hanoi, Vietnam in July and one in Prague in September in the Czech Republic. The new desks will be staffed by a combination of local employees and staff from Korea and will utilize Citi’s global network to actively support Korean companies. Financial services to be provided include corporate banking, investment banking, local debt raising, foreign exchange, cash management and trade finance.

“Our corporate clients are expanding their business worldwide based on their global competitiveness and strong brand awareness. The Korea desk strategy is effective in successfully supporting the local needs of our Korean multi-national clients along with Citi’s global network, and Citibank Korea’s strategy to reinforce support and investment for Korean multi-national clients is reflected in this expansion,” said MS Yoo, Head of Corporate Banking for Citibank Korea.

Over recent years Citi has invested in building up a network of Asia desks across the world to support these types of companies in the local markets in which they operate. With a network of over 100 countries in the world, Citi more often than not has the local infrastructure and domestic knowledge in place to support these companies in markets across the likes of EMEA, South America and North America.

The national desks have proved to be a strong foundation for Citi’s strategy of growing its business with Asian multinationals globally. It is an important competitive advantage for Citi.

“Asian desks are core to Citi’s strategy of increasing and growing our relationship with some of the bank’s most important and rapidly internationalising clients in the region. These desks underline Citi’s commitment to our clients to support them wherever they want to do business and we are seeing an increase of share of wallet with them as a result,” said Gerald Keefe, Head of Corporate Banking for Citi in Asia.

Citi has desks for parent clients from China, South Korea, India and Taiwan which provide support across areas such as cash management, local markets capital markets fund raising, hedging and trade finance. These desks are staffed by a combination of local experts working in partnership with relationship bankers who speak the local language and have experience of banking these companies previously.

Citi now has 9 China desks (Hong Kong, Singapore, Johannesburg, London, Dubai, New York, Sao Paolo, Nairobi and Almaty). These desks are also supporting the increased flows Citi is seeing from its clients between China and Africa and China and Latin America. There is also an India desk in New York and a Taiwan desk in China to capture these strong flows.