Indian IT firm Wipro Technologies is in the spotlight for the “biggest blunder in banking history” by American financial services company Citibank. According to a report in Moneycontrol, Citibank uses a “six eyes” protocol for high-value transactions, which is essentially an extra measure of precaution requiring three individuals to sanction the transfer of large sums of money. 

In August 2020, Citibank transferred $900 million, instead of the $8 million loan that was sanctioned, to cosmetics company Revlon in the presence of the “six eyes”. Two of those individuals were Wipro employees.

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To add to their woes, Citibank also lost a legal battle in the US to recover the money. 

Responding to queries from Moneycontrol, Citibank said, “As a result of a review undertaken last year (2019), we are in the process of upgrading our loan operations platform. We take pride in the role that we play as a global leader in financial services and recognise that an operational error of this nature is unacceptable. We have put significant, additional controls in place until the new system is operational.”

“While many lenders have recognised the payment was in error and returned several hundred million dollars so far, other lenders have either refused to return or have not committed to return the funds. Those funds have been frozen by court order. We believe the law is on our side and that we will recover the outstanding funds,” the firm said. 

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Wipro and Citibank’s partnership goes back a long way. In 2008, the Indian tech firm bought Citi Technology Services, the India-based provider of IT services to Citigroup entities across the world. 

Wipro also took over the operation and management of Citibank’s data centre at Germany’s Meerbush. Citi also ranks among Wipro’s top clients, accounting for nearly $250 million of business annually.