Citibank United Arab Emirates


Citibank National Association, United Arab Emirates commonly known as Citibank U.A.E., is a franchise subsidiary of Citigroup, a multinational financial services corporation headquartered in New York City, United States. Citi U.A.E. is connected by a network spanning 98 markets across the world. The phone support call center for Citibank U.A.E. retail banking clients is based at Citibank Bahrain.

History

Established in 1964, when the Citibank U.A.E., opened its first branch in Dubai. A second branch in Abu Dhabi was opened in 1971.

Branches

Citibank U.A.E. has full service branches in only three of the seven Emirates, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah.

Products & Services

Citibank U.A.E. offers consumers and institutions a range of financial products and services, including consumer banking and credit; corporate and investment banking; institutional equity research and sales; foreign exchange, credit cards, commercial banking; and treasury and trade solutions and an E-Brokerage.

Bank account requirements

Since 2015, Citibank U.A.E. requires new retail banking clients to maintain 35,000 AED, or multi-currency AED equivalent minimum balance for a basic current/checking account with a debit card.

Online brokerage

The Dubai International Financial Centre domiciled, Citibank U.A.E. E-Brokerage for DIY Investors. charges 1% of traded amount per transaction and 0.2% custody fees per year, calculated on the average balance of assets under custody and charged quarterly. This fee structure is considered very high compared to Interactive Brokers or Charles Schwab. Whereby Interactive Brokers are charging only 1 cent per share and Charles Schwab charging $4.95 per trade or even zero for some of their exchange traded funds, while also offering more technically advanced trading platforms.

Capital Markets & Investment Banking Operations

In Dubai, operations are based at Dubai International Financial Centre licensed under Citigroup Global Markets Ltd. and Citibank, N.A., started in 2006.
In Abu Dhabi, operations are based at Abu Dhabi Global Market, licensed under Citibank N.A., started in 2018.

Offshore booking center

Citibank U.A.E. is also used an offshore booking center for loans, and other products, for tax efficiency purposes.

Digital wallet support

Citibank U.A.E. used to support their own Citi Pay digital wallet for their debit and credit cards. This mobile wallet was discontinued on 30 June 2019. Samsung Pay, Apple Pay and Google Pay are not supported.

Multi-factor authentication

Security options available include: Citi Mobile® Token with Citi Mobile® App to authenticate all, transactions, replacing One-Time Passwords via SMS. Which is paired with a mobile device.
However Citi Mobile® Token token activation requires the less secure SMS one-time PIN messages sent to registered mobile numbers. And fallback to SMS OTP is still available even after Citi Mobile® Token token is activated.