Deborah McWhinney, former head of Charles Schwab's RIA has wasted no time imposing a new order on Citi's (C) retail services. She has moved the bank to a fee-only model, eliminating brokers who are paid commissions per trade. Such brokers are free to stay with the company, but they will be working as consultants who refer business to others.

Perhaps even more significantly, she is embracing an RIA model that will feature advisors from third parties. The bank is actively looking for such partners now. All this makes a lot of sense, especially from someone coming from Schwab. It's all in line with industry trends. Citi only had about 600 brokers left. The rest were sold to a joint venture with Morgan Stanley (MS).  

For more:
- here's an article from Investment News

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