Citi acquires Old Lane and new head of alternative investments

Citi has bought US hedge fund Old Lane Partners and appointed one of its founders, Vikram Pandit, as chief executive of Citigroup Alternative Investments (CAI). Pandit’s co-founder John Havens will also join CAI as president.

The transaction will complete and the pair will start during the third quarter of 2007. They will both be based in New York and will report to Citi’s chairman and chief executive, Charles Prince, and to the chairman of the executive committee, Robert Rubin.

Pandit and Havens founded Old Lane in 2006. The global multi-strategy hedge fund now has assets under management (AUM) of $4.5 billion, 16 members and 120 staff in the US, UK and India.

The bank hopes the deal will boost its alternative assets division, which is the smallest in the bank, with fewer than 1,000 staff. As of March 31, its AUM stood at $53.7 billion.

The previous head of CAI, Michael Carpenter, left in March 2006, and the position has been covered by chief administrative officer Lewis Kaden since then.