Investments

Our expertise in and access to global markets provide you with insights and the broadest range of investment opportunities, which we accompany with the highest level of service.

Voted Best Chief Investment Office in Private Banking at the Professional Wealth Management (PWM) Global Private Banking Awards 2022.

Preserving and growing great wealth requires a distinctive approach.

In our experience, the families who have remained among the world’s wealthiest for generations have typically built great investment portfolios that follow a disciplined, long-term plan.

We therefore customize a long-term investment plan that addresses your risk and return goals, as well as your other requirements.

This forms the basis of the complementary core and opportunistic portfolios that we then help you to build with our global team of asset management professionals.

To populate your core and opportunistic portfolios, we give you comprehensive access to global opportunities across all asset classes.

These opportunities are accessible via self-directed portfolios, discretionary managed portfolios, capital markets strategies, and extensively vetted third-party traditional and alternative investment managers.

As a close partner of Citi’s Institutional Clients Group, the Private Bank provides you with the same caliber of ideas, resources and opportunities as the world’s leading institutional investors receive

Our Global Client Service can provide even greater local access to opportunities in other regions of the world, with additional Private Bankers and Investment Counselors to serve you locally.

Our mission is to be the highest quality, most independent, research-driven global investments platform of any private bank.

David Bailin
Chief Investment Officer

How we serve you

Our Investment Philosophy
Our Investment Philosophy guides our entire approach to helping you maintain, grow, and wisely manage your wealth. It rests on certain key principles:

Most of your wealth, apart from your business holdings, should be invested in a core portfolio diversified by asset class, geography and sources of return. Diversification is essential, as portfolios concentrated in few countries or asset classes are riskier and perform worse over time.

Market timing and cash hoarding are a fool’s game. Your core portfolio should be fully invested for the long term and regularly adjusted to remain in line with your customized investment plan.

Disciplined opportunistic investing can complement your core portfolio’s performance. Your alpha-seeking opportunistic portfolio’s investments can be short or long term, aiming to capitalize on market dislocations, your high-conviction beliefs, and preferred themes.

Learn more about our investment philosophy
Our investment process
Your return goals, risk tolerance, and other criteria frame the strategic asset allocation we customize for you.

Our proprietary strategic asset allocation methodology estimates returns over a ten-year horizon based on valuations.

Higher return estimates likely lead to larger recommended allocations to an asset class, and lower estimates to small allocations.

Our methodology also treats severe losses during a market crisis – rather than volatility – as the most significant risk that you face.

The resulting allocations are tactically adjusted to reflect the recommendations of our Global Investment Committee.

Our discretionary managers also provide regular rebalancing and systematic risk management.

This disciplined approach to asset allocation and portfolio oversight enables you to remain fully invested for the long term.

For deeper insights into your core and opportunistic portfolios, our Global Investment Lab can perform a bespoke analysis to highlight risk exposures and potential opportunities.

Learn more about about our investment process
Your dedicated investments team
We take a team approach to addressing your portfolio’s needs.

Your Private Banker works closely with your Investment Counselor and teams of product and asset class specialists to provide customized investments advice, market perspectives and strategic insight into your portfolio.

Our team approach to your portfolios extends throughout the Private Bank, with timely insights into economics, asset classes and investment strategy from our Chief Investment Officer and Chief Investment Strategist, and Chief Economist.

Our Global Investment Lab is dedicated to analyzing your entire wealth and strives to uncover potential opportunities and risks.

As a Private Bank client, you can expect the same level of exceptional service in each region of the world where you may have business, family, or personal interests.

Learn more about our global investment lab

Our investment services

Investment
Capital markets
Advice and cutting-edge institutional execution covering equities, commodities, fixed income, foreign exchange, rates and hybrids.
Learn more  about Capital markets
Investment
Investment management
Discretionary portfolios spanning equity, fixed income, and multi-asset class. Open architecture platform of strategies from third-party managers.
Learn more  about Investment management
Investment
Alternative investments
Private equity, real estate and hedge funds from leading managers worldwide. Single-manager funds, fund-of-funds, investment clubs, co-investments, separately managed accounts.
Learn more  about Alternative investments
Investment
Direct private investments
Direct, co-investment and joint venture opportunities spanning venture capital, growth equity, real estate, buyout, private credit and distressed strategies.
Learn more  about Direct private investments
Investment
Portfolio analytics
Institutional-caliber advice in relation to your portfolio construction, risk management and investment strategy.
Learn more  about Portfolio analytics
Investment
Sustainable investing
Portfolios that seek societal benefits while maintaining quality and improving investment outcomes.
Learn more  about Sustainable investing
Investment
Hedge funds
Hedge funds provide a comprehensive range of investment strategies across global financial markets.
Learn more  about Hedge funds

Meet our people

Global Head

David Bailin

Chief Investment Officer
Citi Global Wealth Investments
David's LinkedIn profile
“The philosophy driving our investment platform is to be the highest quality, most independent, research-driven global investment platform of any private bank.”

David has overall responsibility for Citi Global Wealth Investments, which unifies the Investments teams of the Private Bank and the Consumer Bank worldwide.

As Chief Investment Officer, David ensures the integration of our asset allocation, manager research and portfolio management teams, and offers his perspectives on the markets.

David joined the Private Bank in 2009 as the Global Head of Managed Investments. He designed the architecture of our global managed investments platform, including its Citi Investment Management unit, and our distinctive private equity, real estate, hedge fund and traditional investment teams. He became Global Head of Investments in October of 2017.

Prior to joining Citi, David was Head of Alternative Investment Asset Management for Bank of America Global Wealth and Investment Management, where he was responsible for client alternative investments across private equity, real estate, venture capital and hedge funds. He has been a co-founder of a hedge fund of funds, Martello Investment Management, and a senior executive at two leading hedge funds, John W. Henry and Company and Ellington Management Group.

David holds a BA with honors from Amherst College and an MBA with honors from Harvard Business School.

OUTLOOK

Mid-Year Wealth Outlook 2023

While our asset allocation strategy remains defensive, investors should consider staying invested and modify portfolios over time.

Find out more
Contact us

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The methodology for each award/rating has been reviewed, but not verified, by Citigroup Inc. (Citi) or its affiliates. Please contact the provider of the relevant award/rating for information regarding eligibility of the underlying criteria and factors utilized in compiling the data. The receipt of an award/rating with respect to a product or service may not be representative of the actual experience of any client and is not a guarantee of future performance success. Citi or its affiliates paid compensation to obtain or use the award/rating. These awards consider information provided by Citi (and other applicants), and do not solicit input or responses from actual clients.

Sustainability and Sustainability Risk 
 Sustainable / Sustainability: In environmental science, the quality of not being harmful to the environment or depleting natural resources, and thereby supporting long-term ecological balance. Sustainability presumes that resources are finite and should be used conservatively and wisely with a view to long-term priorities and consequences of the ways in which resources are used. Within context of sustainable development, operating practices that meet the needs of present users without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs, particularly with regard to use and waste of natural resources. UNESCO assigns four dimensions to sustainable development - society, environment, culture and economy. 
Sustainability Risk: Risk of an environmental, social or governance event or condition that, if it occurs, could cause an actual or a potential material negative impact on the value of an investment. The financial position of the investments in the portfolios managed by a portfolio manager may deteriorate due to the environmental, or social, or governance risks these investments are exposed to, which in turn may impact the market value of investments.
ESG 
There are numerous environmental, social and governance (ESG) data providers that evaluate companies on their ESG performance and provide reports and ratings. Report and ratings methodology, scope and coverage, vary greatly among providers. 
 ESG (“Environmental, Social and Governance”) within an investment context, is an umbrella term for investment approaches that seek to incorporate environmental, social and governance considerations in security selection and investment management, with the aim of achieving a more sustainable, responsible and/or ethical investment outcome