Citi parted company with both people mentioned in its latest equities culture complaint
There have been plenty of recent complaints about the culture in Citi's equities sales and trading business. Many of the people who've been complained about are still there, some in very senior positions. However, both people mentioned in the complaint last week by Christine O’Reilly, an ICAP broker, have gone.
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In a complaint against ICAP, Citi and her ICAP manager, Janie McCathie, O'Reilly alleges that Citi equities trader, Benjamin Waters, made unwanted sexual advances, and that his boss, Bhavin Parikh, promised to do something about it, but failed to change Waters' behaviour.
Neither Waters nor Parikh are named defendants in the case. Neither responded to an attempt to contact them on social media.
Citi said that both Waters and Parikh are no longer working for the bank. Both men were based in London. The FCA Register shows Parikh leaving in 2022 and Waters leaving in December 2023. Neither man is listed as working anywhere else.
It's not clear why either left. O'Reilly didn't file her complaint until March 2024. She says she first met Waters in 2018 or 2019 and that by 2020 he was making inappropriate sexual advances. She claims that she told Parikh about Waters' behaviour in April 2021. Parikh allegedly agreed to stop Waters from pestering O'Reilly, but O'Reilly says that Waters then badgered her again, asking for "photos" two months later.
Both Waters and Parikh worked for Citi's delta one desk. The delta one desk is coincidentally also where an unnamed Citi trader overrode 711 warning messages in May 2022 resulting in a £38m loss and a £62m fine from UK regulators. It's not claimed that either man was implicated in this event.
While Citi has said goodbye to Waters and Parikh for reasons unknown, ICAP is still embracing Janie McCathie, who's also based in London. The FCA Register says McCathie has worked for the brokerage firm since at least 2008. O'Reilly claims that McCathie encouraged her to underplay the harassment by Waters because he'd put $4bn of trades through ICAP. By our reckoning, Waters was aged around 26 at the time.
ICAP didn't respond to a request to comment. Having allegedly berated O'Reilly for not being "fun" and "flirty" enough with ICAP's major 26-year-old client, O'Reilly claims McCathie told her to "f*ck off" before later messaging to say, "I love u.” Sounds confusing.
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