23 Facts About Citibank

Citibank was founded in 1812 as the City Bank of New York, and later became First National City Bank of New York.

Between 1910 and 1911, the Department of State backed a consortium of American investors headed by Citibank to acquire control over the Banque Nationale de la Republique d'Haiti, which was the sole commercial bank of Haiti and served as the Haitian government's treasury.

Citibank then pressured the federal government to occupy Haiti, which it did in 1915.

Citibank would go on to acquire some of its largest gains in the 1920s due to debt payments from Haiti, according to later filings to the Senate Finance Committee.

Citibank unsuccessfully tried again from 1977 to 1987 to create a separate credit card brand, the Choice Card.

Related searches

Under his leadership, the next 14 years would see Citibank become the largest bank in the United States, the largest issuer of credit cards and charge cards in the world, and expand its global reach to over 90 countries.

In 2013, Citibank purchased the credit card portfolio of Best Buy from Capital One.

In 2002, Citigroup, the parent of Citibank, acquired Golden State Bancorp and its California Federal Bank, which was one-third owned by Ronald O Perelman, for $5.

In 1999, Citibank was sued for improperly charging late fees on its credit cards.

Citibank will take more than 9,000 square feet of space in the Berkshire Court building at Preston and Northwest Highway.

The new Citibank office is described as an “experience center” in the planning documents.

On November 4,2007, Charles Prince resigned as the chairman and chief executive of Citigroup, the parent of Citibank, following crisis meetings with the board in New York in the wake of billions of dollars in losses related to subprime lending.

In March 2008, Citibank set up Mobile Money Ventures, a joint venture with SK Telecom, to develop mobile apps for banking.

On October 19,2011, Citigroup, the parent of Citibank, agreed to a $285 million civil fraud penalty after the US Securities and Exchange Commission accused the company of betting against risky mortgage-related investments that it sold to its clients.

Citibank was listed among the American banks that were named as having handled the laundered funds, with banks in the US processing around $63.

Citibank was listed as having processed $37 million of that amount, with others including Bank of America, which processed $14 million.

In March 2018, Citibank announced a new firearms policy, placing restrictions on financial transactions in the US firearm industry.

In 1998, the General Accounting Office issued a report critical of Citibank's handling of funds received from Raul Salinas de Gortari, brother of Carlos Salinas, the former president of Mexico.

The report, titled "Raul Salinas, Citibank and Alleged Money Laundering", indicated that Citibank facilitated the transfer of millions of dollars through complex financial transactions that hid the funds' paper trail.

The report indicated that Citibank took on Salinas as a client without making a thorough inquiry as to how he made his fortune, an omission that a Citibank official called a violation of the bank's "know your customer" policy.

Citibank is one of the lead lenders to the developers of the Dakota Access Pipeline project in North Dakota, a 1,172-mile-long oil pipeline project.

Citibank has been punished by the Japanese Financial Services Agency twice for aiding and abetting money laundering by Yakuza members; there was no punishment from the US side.

Citibank is the main sponsor of New York City's bike-share scheme Citi Bike since its launch in 2013.