Citi parnters with Horizon Securities Corp.

With this investment, Citi will be among the first foreign financial institutions to partner with a local Vietnamese securities firm, allowing it to reinforce its leadership position in Vietnam.

Founded in 2006, Horizon Securities is a privately-held Vietnamese firm headquartered in Ho Chi Minh City that provides brokerage and corporate finance services. Horizon Securities Corporation operates as a subsidiary of Horizon Capital Group.

“Our expansion in Vietnam is consistent with our broader goal of growing our franchise in the ASEAN market. We will continue to invest in our markets business to help our regional and global clients who are increasingly looking to invest in Asian equities given the region’s growth prospects,” said Rodrigo Zorrilla, head of Markets Asia Pacific at Citi.

Asia Pacific is one of the most important growth markets for Citi globally. In the last three years, Citi Asia Pacific has generated close to $45 billion of revenues and $15 billion in net income.

"The Citi- Horizon Securities partnership demonstrates that the Vietnam’s economy as a whole, and the Vietnamese stock market in particular, remains attractive to top-tier foreign investors with a mid- to long-term vision for Vietnam," said Kham Manh Doan, chairman of Horizon Capital Group.

“Our partnership with Horizon Securities further extends our markets platform and gives us the ability to offer our clients better access to the Vietnamese capital markets through best in class equity brokerage execution,” said Brett Krause, Citi country officer for Vietnam.

This investment will help Citi become a leader in the secondary market and allow the bank to increase market share of institutional investor equity flows as the Vietnamese market resumes strong growth and depth of liquidity.

Since 2007, Citi has helped Vietnam issuers raise more than $2.8 billion from the domestic and international capital markets, according to data from Dealogic.