While online bill pay has become a mainstream practice among consumers, acceptance rates of electronic bills (e-bills) have been modest at best. The good news is that the perceived barriers to consumer adoption can all be overcome and the timing is favorable for its acceptance. Citi will provide a review of varying e-billing models and associated best practices. A step-by-step approach to deployment and marketing strategies for paperless billing adoption will also be discussed.

Managing global treasury operations is complex and it can be challenging to stay well informed on economic, currency and tax issues in countries outside your home country. Many of you have asked about tax and jurisdictional issues surrounding global and multi-currency pooling accounts. At this webinar, we will provide a brief economic update and lead a discussion on global pooling of accounts and the resulting tax implications.

Dana Peterson, Economist and Director of Citi Research, will provide an economic update including how some external forces may impact the Canadian economy. Dana has specific responsibility for producing macroeconomic forecasts and analysis, as well as market research pieces for the Canadian economy.

Steve Percy, Product Manager of Liquidity Solutions, Citi Canada, will partner with Jeffrey Trossman, Counsel from the law firm of Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP. Jeffrey practices in all areas of income tax planning, including M&A, multijurisdictional corporate reorganizations and restructuring, private equity, international taxation and the taxation of REITs and other investment funds. He has authored many articles for the Canadian Tax Foundation, the International Tax Review and other publications.

Citi UAE hosted a client webinar by the Securities team on April 18th ,2013  to provide a  brief on the implementation of “Buyer Cash Compensation” being introduced by Dubai Financial Market.  Given this important development,  Patrick Kong Senior Vice President Market Services Borse Dubai joined the Citi team to  speak to clients on the upcoming procedures being introduced on the “Buyer Compensation” that will be in effect from May 2013. This is an important market development where Custodian of an end buyer receives cash compensation from DFM instead of purchased securities being unavailable for delivery.

Citi Poland hosted a client webinar by Piotr Kalisz on Thursday, April 11th, 2013.  In this webinar, Piotr Kalisz discussed the recent changes in the Polish market, the foreseen outlook, and what this means for foreign investors.

We aimed to provide an overview of the European landscape and Poland’s financial position in EU looking at Poland’s economy in 2012 and main financial indicators i.e. GDP, CPI, FX rates, Interests Rates, Sovereign Debt and the growth perspective for Poland in 2013. 

Corporate treasurers need solutions that help them balance the changes in the operational and credit risk in their banking footprint, deliver agility in their ability to support the goals of the underlying business and allow for continued cost reduction while increasing efficiency.  The value of these solutions is often driven by how integrated they can be between their corporate ERP and their bank.

The SAP Financial Services Network is an innovative on-demand solution designed to simplify corporate interaction with financial institutions and to address this need.  The network will be hosted by SAP and will include bank routing, data transformation, on-boarding, provisioning, and monitoring capabilities as well as provide access to the analytic capabilities embodied in SAP HANA based architecture. Please join us to learn how this solution can help your business and to provide your views and feedback on what capabilities add value.

In December 2011, the United States Postal Service (USPS) announced changes to delivery standards in the latest attempt to cut costs and reduce expenses by $18 billion by 2015. Since that time a series of changes have been proposed by the USPS that will affect mail movement and in turn our clients and the way they do business. In March 2012 we held an informational session to help educate our clients on these proposed changes and the potential impact to their receivables business. As the USPS recently announced additional changes, Citi’s NA Receivables team in partnership with Phoenix-Hecht is pleased to provide another update on the proposed changes and the impact to our NA Receivables clients’ business.

With less than one year until the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) standards become mandatory, all organizations with Euro credit transfers and direct debits, within the 17 Euro member states, need to ensure full compliance February 1, 2014. This mandatory date is fast-approaching and it is now critical to ensure that your organization is prepared and will fully migrate to the SEPA schemes in advance of the mandatory deadlines. Indeed, with year-end change restrictions taken into account, many organizations will need to be fully compliant by November 2013.

• Have all BIC & IBAN details been collected?
• Will you be able to pay your teams ‘on the ground’?
• If you collect via Euro direct debit today, are you ready to do so via SEPA Direct Debit
• Have payment and collections for vendors, employees and customers been migrated to SEPA?

With multinationals focused on Emerging Markets growth, treasury departments are challenged to re-engineer liquidity and risk management strategies. Leading companies are reassessing how current processes and structures can be refined and extended to deal with the issues faced in more regulated jurisdictions.

Based on our client advisory work around the world, in this session we review key themes and approaches that leading corporates are taking towards managing treasury in growth markets.

To simplify cross-border payments in the EU, the European Parliament has passed legislation setting 1 February 2014 as the deadline for companies and government agencies within the 17 Euro member states to migrate to SEPA (Single Euro Payments Area) standards. While the introduction of SEPA means that companies will have to change their processes for doing business in Europe, it also creates opportunities to optimize their global treasury structures and increase operational efficiency.

This webinar will explore the benefits of SEPA to companies with Euro payment flows, and focus on key considerations for successfully implementing this initiative. The session will be very useful for treasurers as they finalize their SEPA strategy, execution plan and migration in advance of the regulatory deadline.

With less than one year until Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) standards become mandatory, migrating to a SEPA Direct Debit scheme is a requirement for any organization initiating euro direct debits within the 17 Euro member states.

In this session, we will offer key information on decisions and actions that will enable your organization to choose a SEPA Direct Debit scheme (Core or B2B). This session will help you decide on a mandate management approach and gain practical direct debit migration advice

Mobile Payments has been dubbed the Future of Money and the conventional wisdom is that this is how we will transact in the years to come.

The past six months has been heavy with news flow indicating that there are now wider choices than before in Mobile Payments and these announcements have also given us better clarity on what can and cannot work. Subsequently, we've found that there is a need to address questions that go to the heart of what is changing within Payments. In this session, we focus on eight questions that address the issues of business model evolution, technology and adoption.
1. Processing "Rails" and Transactions
2. Incumbents and Their Actions
3. Targeted Offers and Data Ownership
4. Ecosystem Evolution
5. Technology Choice and Timeframe
6. Global Standards and Regulation
7. Mobile Wallet Attributes
8. The Holy Grail: Consumer Adoption

Citi hosted a client webinar on the pending Italy Financial Transaction Tax, effective from 1st March 2013, and covered the important changes introduced by the decree issued by the Italian Government at the beginning of February and informed clients of their obligations and process as well as the involvement of intermediaries Banks and Brokers. Following the decree, it is important that we communicate with our clients as soon as possible to provide them with this update.

We hope 2013 will be a less disappointing year for Emerging Market Economies with more certainty and better clarity about global trends and developments. Yet as expected, uncertainty abounds and we will have to forge out business and investment strategies to take advantage of a continued opaque outlook. We can be certain of at least three sources of uncertainty: (1) the struggle to avoid the US Fiscal Cliff will continue; (2) policies to solidify the Euro Area remain captive to political vagaries (most immediately the Italian and German elections); and (3) China’s new leadership must rebalance the economy, sustain growth, and deliver stability-enhancing reforms. 

Emerging Market business and investment strategies will have to contend with weak external demand from the Advanced Economies. So Emerging Market policy makers will likely focus on boosting domestic demand and pursue policies biased toward weaker rather than stronger exchange rates—so long as inflation remains in check. Also we will discuss what this means for policy surprises going forward.

In this session, we will address the key concerns of corporate treasurers in Asia Pacific and strategies they are planning to adopt to run, protect and grow their businesses.

This webinar offers insights from Citi's Treasury Diagnostics benchmarking survey of 350 clients in Asia Pacific and examines factors such as macro-economics, regulatory challenges, and technology changes. Based on these observations along with our vantage point of working with many of the world's leading companies, we will share with you the top treasury priorities of 2013.

Managing global treasury operations is complex and it can be challenging to stay well informed on economic and currency issues in countries outside your home country. To help you with this challenge, we invite you to attend a webinar where Citi experts will provide an economic and currency update on Canada. We will review the Canadian economy and dollar with some of the external forces that may influence both. This webinar is targeted at multinational companies that have business operations or interest in Canada.

In light of regulatory developments, counterparty credit rating changes and downward pressure on investment returns, many of Citi’s clients have expressed interest in gaining perspective on investment policies and counterparty assessments as they manage through this environment.

Citi and Treasury Strategies would like to welcome you to a discussion on this topic where we will examine potential upcoming regulatory changes that will impact the investments space. We will highlight some of the evolving practices in developing Investment Policies within an organization as well as recent trends in managing cash investments.

This webinar will be hosted by Michael Berkowitz and Declan McGivern of Citi Transaction Services, and will include a presentation and discussion with Mike Gallanis of Treasury Strategies.

There is a new UK regulation relating to PAYE Real Time Information (RTI) which comes into effect in April 2013. This regulation will affect every employer that pays salaries through Bacs (UK low value clearing). The change does not affect PAYE itself but just the way and how often the PAYE details are sent to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC).

With this change, all PAYE details will need to be sent electronically as part of the routine payroll process every time a payment is made. The aim of the regulation is to ensure that more people pay the accurate amount of tax and National Insurance.

Citi will support all affected clients to ensure the implementation of this requirement is as smooth as possible. We are working with the Bacs scheme and HMRC to understand the impact of RTI on clients and aim to ensure all our clients are fully prepared by April 2013.

Citi is hosted a client webinar jointly with HMRC to raise awareness of RTI, please click on the link to view material or watch a replay.

Today’s complex operating environment poses a number of challenges to corporate treasurers, particularly with respect to maximizing the efficient use of liquidity. To help clients overcome the many difficulties associated with effective liquidity management, Citi Liquidity Management Services offers a wide array of industry leading liquidity services designed to address treasury needs in a reliable, robust, and highly flexible manner. To maintain its leading competitive position, Citi has continued to evolve its liquidity capabilities to meet increasingly complex client needs. Please join the L&I team as we review the latest market trends and client needs as they relate to liquidity management, the latest enhancements to Citi’s market leading capabilities, and the current tools available that best illustrate Citi’s value proposition.

The market is changing rapidly and it is important to stay abreast of new developments and the emergence of the digital bank. Please join Citi to discuss the digital bank beyond just mobile/online, and how it will transform corporate-to-bank connectivity. We will be exploring market trends, ERP integration in the cloud, 3SKey, and interfacing based on standards.

Earlier this year, the European Parliament passed legislation setting 1 February 2014 as the end date for the migration of Euro ACH credit transfers and direct debits to Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) standards, within the 17 Euro Member States. This mandatory date is fast–approaching and it is now critical to ensure that your organization is ready and prepared to migrate to the SEPA schemes in advance of the mandatory deadline. This session will focus on the key considerations for implementing SEPA and provide practical guidance for meeting the end date.

Don’t miss this opportunity to join the conversation.

As Basel III looms on the regulatory landscape, its implications will extend beyond the banks with impact on the corporate community as well. Join Citi thought leaders for the next installment in our Advisory Webinar Series, where we will take an in-depth look at Basel III and its current status.

During this one hour session we will examine the overall regulatory landscape, Basel III’s implications for today’s market, and how new demand on banks will ultimately change the cost of liquidity. John Ahearn and Elyse Weiner will discuss how this will likely affect corporate treasurers and their overall liquidity management processes.

On 24 April 2012, an exemption that previously applied to non-US funds, CFTC Regulation 4.13(a)(4), was rescinded and this becomes effective on 31 December 2012. Consequently, fund managers with at least one U.S. investor and with holdings in derivatives such as futures, options on futures and “swaps” per the recent CFTC definition (e.g. FXs, IRS, CDS etc.), have until 31 December 2012 to either register with the CFTC, avail of an alternative exemption where possible or cease trading the derivative instruments within scope of this requirement. This webcast will assist in giving an overview of how this change may impact you and you can use this webcast to learn about these new requirements and prepare for their implementation.

We'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for participating in our latest Citi Online Academy webinar, The Changing Landscape in Europe: A Macro Economic Update and Review of Implications for Treasurers. This session provides an update on the current situation and Citi’s views on how this may evolve; as well as a review of what leading Treasurers are doing to prepare and manage for the prolonged crisis.

At your earliest convenience, please take a moment to complete our survey, so that we can ensure future sessions are focused on the topics that are most important and relevant to you. The survey should take no more than two minutes.

Citi is pleased to partner with the American Trucking Association and Syncada to bring you the latest information on market trends and opportunities in today’s transportation and logistics market.

Many global companies have freight and logistics spend management as a strategic priority in 2012 and beyond. Find out the specific pain points that our clients face through a lively discussion moderated by Bob Costello, Chief Economist and Vice President for the American Trucking Associations. He will be joined by Kurt Schneiber, Chief Executive Officer of Syncada and Citi experts Jeff Cousins and Jeff Carlson.

Don't miss this opportunity to join the conversation.

Citi hosted a client webinar to discuss the opportunities for growth in the retail and institutional asset management industry in China, drawing from the findings of the China asset management report compiled by Z–Ben Advisors for Citi.

Listen to the replay of the webinar or view the materials that looks at the Overview of findings

• Forecast for public (mutual fund) assets to triple by 2015: from RMB2.3tr (USD360bn) today to at least RMB6.8tr (USD1tr) in total assets by 2015 and possibly doubling again by 2020, as policy changes are instituted to encourage the development of investment markets and internalization of the currency
• Given the disparity between China’s current 11% share of global market capitalization and investors’ 0.1% allocation to the country, global investors’ allocation to China could potentially increase by tenfold, or even more
• China Investment Corporation (CIC), a major global sovereign wealth fund, is will soon transition from its first generation of managers. Expect manager turnover in favour of alternative asset classes, and niche traditional managers with a strong performance track record
• Foreign banks will become fund distributors in the near future. To facilitate partnerships with fund managers, foreign banks will first need to attract much larger numbers of high-net-worth investors
• Offshore subsidiaries of Chinese financial firms should be much higher on their global competitors’ radar screens. No foreign firm will be able to equal their access to the domestic Chinese market in the next ten years
• Download the research here

Global uncertainty has become more intense as risks and vulnerabilities unfold in every region. Corporate Treasurers must ensure that they tap all available global intelligence gathering resources to synthesize the impact of these global and regional risks on their own operations and organizations. This webinar is designed to update you on the latest global economic developments, and to help you place them in a strategic perspective that can help to realign your plans and possibly redeploy resources as events unfold.

On 25 July 2012, ESMA published its guidelines in relation to issues surrounding exchange traded funds, the use of financial indices by UCITS and other general UCITS issues. The aim is to strengthen investor protection and ensure greater harmonisation in regulatory practices. This webinar sets out the key provisions, challenges and timelines in more detail.

The European Commission published a consultation paper on 26 July 2012 covering 8 topics for discussion with the aim of keeping the UCITS framework topical & in line with the evolution of the investment markets. This webinar reviews the paper in more detail. It features a summary of the following areas: Product rules, liquidity management, depositary, money market funds, long-term investments, UCITS IV ’tweaking‘.

Citi hosted a client webinar providing an update on the French Financial Transaction Tax that came into effect on the 1st August 2012.

The French Financial Transaction Tax is applied on purchases of eligible French Securities regardless of where they are traded, settled and held. As such the introduction of this tax impacts all clients (both buy and sell side) globally trading in eligible French securities. A tax of 0.1% will be applied to acquisitions for consideration of taxable securities, when the transaction generates a transfer of ownership, even if the securities are traded outside of France. Accountable parties are either the Investment Service Provider or broker who has executed the transaction on its behalf or on behalf of its client or the account holder of the investor (e.g. for over-the-counter transactions). The law provides exemptions provisions, but further clarification is to be confirmed notably through the Decree of Application and the Fiscal Instruction.

The webinar covered important changes to the Regulation voted by the French Senate at the end of July and informed clients of their reporting obligations and process for delivering tax declaration reports to Citi.

On 18 March 2010 President Obama signed into law the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment ("HIRE") Act. Included in HIRE are provisions which were introduced in 2009 as the Foreign Accounts Tax Compliance Act ("FATCA").

Increase your understanding of FATCA proposed regulations:

1. Introduce a new 30% withholding tax on certain US source payments, including gross proceeds from the sale of US securities, made to foreign financial institutions and non-financial foreign entities, unless certain disclosures respecting US owners are made or an exemption applies.
2. Understand the application of the four keystones to FATCA and the immediate challenges of data gathering:
   • Classification
   • Due Diligence
   • Withholding
   • Reporting

This webinar is most relevant to managers on FATCA projects, tax operations, compliance, anti-money laundering and IT. It also benefits investor and intermediary client segments including funds, insurance, broker dealers, private banks, ICSDs and CSDs.

What are the implications of the Dodd-Frank Remittance Rules on your business? This webinar will provide you with helpful information on the requirements of the Final Rule amending Regulation E, implementing Dodd-Frank 1073 as published. There are many parties involved in providing cross border remittance services and these rules affect them all differently. We will discuss what section 1073 requirements are, who is subject to those rules and what the broader implications might be for international correspondent banking.

Mobile technology is no longer just the way of the future, it is the way of today. Nowhere is this more true than in emerging markets, where we have seen a steady increase of mobile users in the consumer space over the past few years. This trend is expected to continue and blossom in developed markets as well, spilling over to the corporate banking space. While we have seen successful business models on the consumer side, corporate users will face different challenges to achieve the same adoption.

In this webinar, Citi’s Mobile Payments experts will discuss the opportunities for mobile solution development from around the world. The session will explore the opportunity and case for both the emerging and developed markets as well as describe the differing functionality needs for both opportunities. This webinar looks at the ecosystem holistically and sets the landscape for how various different entities fit in. The speaker also examines the common factors that encourage success in the space as well as imagines the future in terms of functionality, path and value.

This webcast provides an overview of the proposed changes to the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive, or MiFID – the European Union law, which has harmonised the regulation of investment services in Europe since 2007. The original directive was a landmark law whose primary objectives were to increase competition and consumer protection in investment services in Europe. The full impact these proposed changes would have on the provision of investment services has been the subject of much debate and controversy and needs to be looked at in the context of other regulatory reforms such as the European Market Infrastructure Regulation and the review of the Market Abuse Directive.

Many corporates have significant potential to improve their cash application processes through an efficient, integrated reconciliation solution, thereby gaining more from their SSC setup. The primary tangible benefit of optimized cash application is saving costs. This is achieved by reducing the manual effort for post-processing, and consolidating data automatically from different ERPs and bank accounts. Reducing the time to post funds against outstanding customer invoices frees up customer credit lines and allows for sales to sign more business, supporting their companies’ competitive position.

Please join Citi Transaction Services’ Receivables and Channel Services specialists together with Hanse Orga as they present their exclusive session, “Boosting Automated Cash Application Performance.” The session will cover the following topics:

• Best practices and tools to automate and improve cash application
• Optimizing manual post processing
• Case Study from Honeywell
• How to put together a business case for cash application

We are also delighted to have Honeywell as co–presenters to discuss some of the reconciliation challenges they had in their operation and their experience with Hanse Orga’s product Autobank® for SAP®.

There will be an opportunity for a Q&A session towards the end of the webinar.

The French Tax on Financial Transactions law will come into force from 1 August 2012. A tax of 0.1% will be applied to acquisitions for consideration of taxable securities, when the transaction generates a transfer of ownership, even if the securities are traded outside of France. Accountable parties are either the Investment Service Provider or broker who has executed the transaction on its behalf or on behalf of its client or the account holder of the investor (e.g. for over-the-counter transactions). The law provides exemptions provisions, but further clarification is to be confirmed notably through the Decree of Application and the Fiscal Instruction.

This webinar will provide information on accountable parties, scope, determination of taxable transactions, mandatory tax declaration reporting requirements and payments of tax, as well as the penalty regime.

Temos o prazer de convidá–lo ao seminário online onde compartillharemos com você a nova solução CitiDirect BE Mobile, através da qual você pode autorizar pagamentos diretamente de seu aparelho celular como também consultar transações e saldo de sua conta. Isso facilita suas decisões financeiras em qualquer momento e lugar. É uma excelente ferramenta para se utilizar durante viagens, em uma reunião ou sem acesso a um computador oferecendo uma interface inovadora, conveniente, segura e precísa.

O aplicativo CitiDirect BE Mobile já está disponível em 21 países de América Latina, em 56 países entre Europa, Oriente Médio, áfrica, América do Norte e Ásia. São 300,000 usuários que representam mais de 50,000 clientes.

Reúna-se com os especialistas regionais do Citi para aprender mais sobre CitiDirect BE Mobile, sua funcionalidade e como essa inovacão pode ajudar a simplificar o día–a–día de suas operações bancárias.

The Kuwait Stock Exchange signed an agreement with NASAQ OMX in October 2009 to implement a revolutionary new platform called X-Stream. This new system has been in implementation for the past 3 years and was officially launched on 13th May 2012.

The new system will facilitate the advancement of the Kuwaiti Market and bring the KSE closer to its goal of creating depth in the market, as well as increasing market efficiency and transparency. Along with the launch of X-Stream, the KSE will be reclassifying market sectors as well as introduce a new index called the Kuwait 15 Index.

Citi hosted a webinar where they discussed the changes that this new system will bring and its impact on the Kuwaiti market.

Please listen to the replay of the webinar or view the presentation material.

Today’s corporate systems and technologies are evolving more rapidly than ever. Changing regulations further muddy the waters while the pressure to optimize and leverage bank integration solutions for improved efficiencies and cost savings continues to grow. Although challenging, several options for achieving these goals are available.

Join Citi’s experts as they discuss:

• The latest product enhancements seen in the marketplace
• New innovative solutions for ERP integration
• Case studies that demonstrate creative ways to manage the ERP integration challenge

The Pharmaceutical and Healthcare industry in Latin America is growing at a rapid pace, with Healthcare sales expected to grow 36% to 2015. The competitive landscape of the industry is changing significantly, with mergers and acquisitions consolidating key local players, imports replacing local Pharma manufacturing, population demographics changing consumer demands patterns, and new regulations affecting market dynamics.

Turkey will have an important market change as of 1 July 2012 where the Central Registry Agency (CRA) will provide an electronic environment to the issuer companies and to their shareholders for their general assembly meetings. Furthermore, the CRA is working on enhancing the current proxy process by implementing key changes regarding share blockage, documentation procedures and partial voting.

Citi Turkey co-hosted a webinar with the CRA on the changes and covered topics such as Electronic AGM System, voting barriers and the benefits of the coming system.

Achieving operational efficiencies and improving controls around the account management process is increasingly becoming a core topic and a requirement of large corporates with Shared Service Centres. Standardisation of the technology, process and security provide the opportunity to remove complexity and cost. This webinar considers the current status and future developments in eBAM, covering the following topics:

• Current status of eBAM and uptake in the market
• Comparison of proprietary bank solutions and XML multibank solutions
• The SWIFT EBAM Central Utility (ECU) update and future for eBAM XML
• Case studies from Citi clients using eBAM

Special session for clients in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

In collaboration with Citi’s Treasury Diagnostics program, The NeuGroup’s Global Cash and Banking Group, a collection of 25 Fortune 500 senior treasury practitioners from a variety of industries, conducted a year-long project to identify core treasury and cash management principles designed to guide any treasury department aspiring to become world-class.

The team surveyed industry stakeholders on a wide range of cash management topics. The result is a series of principles, developed by corporate practitioners, across core treasury operations and cash management categories. These will aid companies in defining what a world-class treasury operation looks like and help them determine when they have achieved their goals.

The United States Postal Service (USPS) is currently undergoing a review of several changes to their organization which may impact your receivables business. The United States Postal Service (USPS) is currently undergoing a review of several changes to their organization which may impact your receivables business. Citi is diligently monitoring the situation and working to ensure that any impact can be reasonably managed or minimized.

We would like to extend you the opportunity to join Citi and industry specialist Phoenix-Hecht for an informational session regarding the USPS changes and the potential effects to your lockbox processes. During this session Citi’s Ron Tauscher, NA Receivables Market Manager, and industry expert Lex Litton, Senior Vice President at Phoenix Hecht will provide an in-depth discussion regarding the current proposed USPS changes and how Citi has prepared to continue to support our clients in this dynamic environment.

Proposed changes include:

• Changes to processing and delivery time for first-class mail
• Closing of several USPS hubs and processing facilities
• Potential elimination of Saturday mail

Overview
Market Guide, Citi’s proprietary securities market intelligence web channel, has been expanded to include global funds industry and service related information. This webinar helps Citi clients to understand the market and service intelligence you can access through Citi’s Global Market Information Services team who directly touch Citi's 93 markets – includes a live demo of Market Guide’s key features and functionalities.

With financial markets in turmoil, liquidity and funding risk is shaping treasury priorities. While the economic and financial outlook is more opaque than usual, what is clear is that Treasurers should continue to be vigilant about cash flow, counterparty relationships, funding options, and risk mitigation to help lead their companies through 2012. This is a year to continue making the case for change and improvement, and to be prepared to play offense or defense as the situation evolves.

Please join us for this session as we review top priorities for treasury as identified through Citi’s client advisory work, feedback from colleagues around Citi’s worldwide platform, and Citi’s global research programs.

The global demand for commodities – oil, copper, wheat, corn, cotton, etc. – has never been stronger, driven by both developed countries and the emerging markets. The pricing of these commodities is influenced not only by demand but also by natural disasters, domestic and international politics, and various regulations. As the value of world trade in commodities reached historic levels, letters of credit remain an important method for buying and selling such goods.

Please join Citi’s Trade experts as they discuss The Risks of Commodity-Related Letter of Credit Transactions. During this session Citi’s specialists will cover:

• The most common types of commodities purchased under letters of credit
• The usage of both commercial and Standby L/Cs
• Applicable regulations, compliance concerns and DocDex decisions
• Sample transaction wording

This session should prove valuable to Trade Services professionals and to Risk and Relationship staff dealing with commodity transactions.

Due to popular demand, Citi is delighted to provide a rare opportunity to revisit one of this conference season’s most attended and talked about presentations. If you were unable to attend this session at the 2011 AFP Conference, please join us as we revisit Evolving Payments and Collections Strategies in the C2B and B2B Space.

The behaviors of consumers and businesses are shifting rapidly to a wide array of electronic payment methods. Corporations should carefully consider the impacts of these evolving trends in consumer and business payment habits and integrate end-to-end solutions. Businesses must be able to support the infrastructure needed to facilitate new types of commerce. Join Citi’s experts as they explore the impact of the challenges and trends in the C2B and B2B space. This session will examine trends, best practices and provide a framework for overall working capital and efficiency optimization. We will discuss the different ways companies can leverage the shifts in the market and the strategies that can be utilized to maximize business benefits.

Turkey will be implementing an important market change as of 30 June 2012 where government debt instruments will be dematerialized by the Central Registry Agency (CRA) and will begin to register investor holdings at segregated level. Currently, the Central Bank of Turkey holds government debt instruments at local banks level, without investor segregation.

Prior to this important market development, we are pleased to share with you a webinar session that Citi Turkey hosted in conjunction with the CRA.

Overview
As part of China’s efforts to further liberalize its capital markets, Chinese policymakers recently made a number of changes to reinvigorate the QFII scheme, aiming to raise its appeal to foreign investors. In this session, Citi experts provide a detailed update on macro-economic trends in China, the latest on the QFII scheme, the newly announced RQFII programme and Citi's perspective on the implications of the new announcements by the authorities and what to expect in 2012.