Merrill Private Wealth Management chief to lead Citi Private Bank North America

Citibank has announced that one of it’s long-time employees and senior leaders is to retire after 22 years.

Halé Behzadi, head of Citi Private Bank North America, will leave the firm at the end of March after having been a key element in the growth of the private bank and the development of its team through leadership and mentorship. Before her current role, she held various positions including heading up the private bank’s West Coast team.

Her successor is Don Plaus, who joins Citi after more than thirty years at Merrill Lynch, where he was most recently head of Merrill Private Wealth Management, International and Institutional. Plaus retired from the firm last spring.

Plaus has extensive experience of working with high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients and will join the Citi Private Bank leadership team on April 1.

Citi has also announced that Antonio Gonzales will be the new head of Latin America for Citi Private Bank, joining the firm after 18 years at JPMorgan, most recently leading JP Morgan Private Bank for Brazil where he was previously head of investments. He will be based in New York and will join the Citi Private Bank leadership team in May.

Fabio Fontainha, the interim head of the Brazil unit, will transition fully to head of business execution once Gonzales joins.