Vikram Pandit

Vikram Shankar Pandit was born on 14 January 1957, and is an Indian-born American banker. He is the former chief executive of Citigroup, a position he held from December 2007 until he was forced to resign, on 16 October 2012.He holds a B.S. and M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University, and MBA and Ph.D in Finance from Columbia Business School.

Vikram Pandit was the managing director and head of the US Equity Syndicate for Morgan Stanley from the period 1990 to 1994. Then from 1994 till 2000, he worked as the managing director (MD) and head of the Worldwide Institutional Equities Division for the same firm. The accomplished Vikram Pandit finally decided to leave Morgan Stanley Company along with some colleagues to begin a hedge fund, Old Lane Partners that was purchased by the Citigroup in the year 2007 for $800 million.

On 11 December 2007, Pandit was named the new CEO of Citigroup, replacing interim-CEO Sir Winfried Bischoff. Pandit was strongly supported by then interim chairman of Citigroup Robert Rubin, the effective successor to Chuck Prince.

CITIGROUP Citigroup Inc. or Citi is an American multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Manhattan, New York City. Citigroup was formed from one of the world's largest mergers in history by combining the banking giant Citicorp and financial conglomerate Travelers Group in October 1998 (announced on April 7, 1998). As of January 2015, it is the third largest bank holding company in the US by assets. Its largest shareholders include funds from the Middle East and Singapore. At its height until the global financial crisis of 2008 Citigroup was the largest company and bank in the world by total assets with 357,000 employees. In 2007, Citigroup was one of the primary dealers in US Treasury securities. Citigroup had the world's largest financial services network, spanning 140 countries with approximately 16,000 offices worldwide and holds over 200 million customer accounts in more than 140 countries.

Vikram Pandit is a part of the board of the Columbia University, Columbia Business School, the Indian School of Business and The Trinity School. He also happens to be a former board member of NASDAQ, the New York City Investment Fund from the year 2000 till 2003. On 11 December in 2007, Pandit was made the new CEO of Citigroup after the term of interim-CEO, Sir Winfried Bischoff.

AWARDS

• In 2008, Vikram Pandit was also given the coveted Padma Bhushan by the Government of India.