During Marianne Hay's years at Morgan Stanley, one of her responsibilities was managing Quilter Holdings Ltd., a U.K wealth advisory firm based in London.
The deal announced Wednesday between Morgan Stanley and Citigroup Inc. would put Quilter back under her watch.
Citigroup said it had agreed to buy the stand-alone firm with $10.9 billion of assets under management; the price was not disclosed. Quilter is to become part of Citi's global wealth management platform in Europe once the deal closes in the first quarter.
Ms. Hay, the chief executive officer of Citigroup Global Wealth Management Europe, said the deal would make Citi one of the top 10 wealth managers in the United Kingdom. It is the first deal by her business line since she joined Citi in September 2005.
Quilter, which she led for two-and-a-half years, is a service organization that does not manufacture its own products, Ms. Hay said. With its 10 offices in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the Channel Islands, Quilter will help Citi better penetrate in the region.
"We believe [the U.K.] represents one of the biggest opportunities in terms of wealth creation over the next decade," she said.
The wealth advisory firm has 18,000 clients and 300 employees.
Analysts said it is not surprising to see Citi expanding its wealth management operations abroad. Richard X. Bove, an analyst at Punk, Ziegel & Co., said the New York banking company has wanted to expand its wealth management reach since it traded its asset management operations for Legg Mason's brokerage network last December.
"Citi has indicated for some time that it has wanted to expand its wealth management operations outside the U.S. more rapidly than it will inside the U.S.," he said. "Wealth is increasing more quickly outside the U.S. than it is inside of this country. For that reason, this deal makes a lot of sense."
Morgan bought Quilter, which caters to investors with more than $500,000 in investable assets, in 2001. James Gorman, the president of Morgan's global wealth management group, said in a press release that the sale resulted from Morgan's strategy to focus its U.K. wealth management effort on high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth investors.
The Quilter business model, which focuses on discretionary, fee-based wealth advisory services, complements Citigroup's wealth management strategy, Ms. Hay said. "In the private bank, we have adopted a segmentation approach and are targeting clients in the private equity, property investment, and entrepreneurial space," she said.
From here, Citi intends to focus on organic growth, Ms. Hay said, and the company has done significant hiring to develop its private banking business in the United Kingdom this year.
"However," she added, "as you can see from today's announcement, we will consider good opportunities as they come along."
