It’s official: Citigroup is moving its global banking headquarters to Lower Manhattan.
The financial institution signed a deal worth more than $1 billion to renew its 2.7 million-square-foot lease in a two-building complex at SL Green Realty’s 388and 390 Greenwich Street, between Hubert and North Moore streets. Though the bank had already occupied the space, the deal pulls Citi’s headquarters away from 399 Park Avenue at East 53rd Street, where it has centered its operations for years.
The site was considered a frontrunner in Citi’s long search for a new nerve center, beating out contenders at 2 World Trade Center and Hudson Yards. The complex is the largest in SL Green’s sizable portfolio.
Citi secured an option to extend the lease by 15 years when it expires in 2020, as well as a right to repurchase the two buildings outright for roughly $2 billion. Citi owned the complex until SL Green and Ivanhoe Cambridge bought it for nearly $1.6 billion in 2007.
A leasing team from CBRE Group represented Citi in the deal, along with a legal team from law firm Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson. [Crain’s] — Julie Strickland