Michael E. O'Neill has tangled with reputed organized-crime figures and served in the U.S. Marines. Now the former chief executive of Bank of Hawaii Corp. will take on new challenges as the next chairman of Citigroup Inc.
Citigroup plans to nominate the 65-year-old O'Neill to the post to succeed Richard D. Parsons, who has held the chairman job since 2009. As expected, Parsons told the board on Friday that he doesn't plan to stand for re-election at the company's annual shareholders meeting in April, said people familiar with the situation.
O'Neill, who joined Citigroup's board in 2009, has in recent months taken on expanded responsibilities at the third-biggest U.S. bank by assets. In September, he was named chairman of Citibank NA, the New York company's deposit-taking subsidiary. He also serves as a member of the executive committee, as well as the committee with oversight of Citi Holdings, a unit the company created to dispose of unwanted assets.
Among the challenges that O'Neill will face in his new role will be charting a new course for the company in the wake of regulations that have restricted bank profits. CEO Vikram Pandit has said he wants to return Citigroup to its traditional banking roots.
Making banks more profitable is familiar terrain for O'Neill. As the chairman and chief executive of the Bank of Hawaii (BOH) from 2000 to 2004, O'Neill restructured underperforming businesses and refocused operations following a misguided expansion under his predecessor. By the time he left the company, the stock price had more than quadrupled.
As an executive in the 1980s at the London unit of First Interstate Bancorp, O'Neill received threats when he tried to unwind contracts on the bank's books tied to warrants that gave the holder the right to buy Japanese stocks. The trades were profitable for investors, some of whom were reputed organized-crime figures, but risky for First Interstate and the other banks that participated in this gray market.
O'Neill also has had his share of setbacks. He was named CEO of Barclays PLC, the large U.K. bank, in 1999, but resigned two months later after he developed an arrhythmic heartbeat. He no longer has the condition.
He also lost out in a 2009 race for the top job at Bank of America Corp. to Brian Moynihan. O'Neill urged Bank of America directors to break up the Charlotte, N.C., company, a direction they didn't want to take.
