Citi's big new Goldman Sachs hire looks curious for Jens Welter

If you're single-handedly running a business in an investment bank and a co-head suddenly arrives, it's not always good news. Deutsche Bank had a habit of introducing unexpected co-heads under historic former CEO Anshu Jain, who would let the two leaders battle it out. It's not thought that Citi has this approach under Vis Raghavan, but Raghavan's co-head habit isn't necessarily benign either. 

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In February, for example, Raghavan parachuted Ashu Khullar, a corporate banker, into a role as co-head of EMEA financial sponsors alongside Anthony Diamandakis, who'd been running the EMEA financial sponsor business on his own. In March, Diamandakis resigned; he's joining JPMorgan instead.   

Now Raghavan has brought in another co-head. David Friedland, a partner from Goldman Sachs, is arriving as co-head of North American investment banking coverage, Friedland will work alongside Jens Welter, who moved from London to New York after being made Citi's (sole) head of North American investment banking coverage in October 2024.

Will Welter welcome Friedland warmly into his fold? Maybe. In a memo seen by eFinancialCareers, Raghavan said Welter has had a "tremendous impact" on the North American business and that Friedland will "accelerate this progress" and "elevate" the "franchise to even greater heights."  

This all sounds very amicable. And yet, it's notable that when Citi conducted its Bora Bora job cuts in 2023, it focused on removing co-heads. Now Raghavan seems to be adding them in again.  

When Welter was appointed head of North American coverage in at Citi in late 2024, some Citi insiders suggested he was a curious choice for the US coverage job. Welter was previously the EMEA head of investment banking at Credit Suisse for five years, and although he had a global role at the Swiss bank too, that was for a less than a year, before he joined Citi.

Friedland, meanwhile, has spent his entire 27-year career at Goldman Sachs in New York.

Citi's global M&A business is thriving. Revenues there increased 52% year-on-year in the second quarter. As the chart below based on data from Dealogic shows, revenues in two of Citi's key global sectors for M&A increased over 100% in the second quarter.

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