Citi, StanChart evacuate Dubai offices, HSBC closes Qatar branches as fears grow

By Hadeel Al Sayegh and Lawrence White

DUBAI/LONDON, March 11 (Reuters) - Citigroup and Standard Chartered person begun evacuating their Dubai offices, telling unit to enactment from location instead, sources said connected Wednesday, arsenic banks measurement up precautions aft Iran threatened Gulf ‌banking interests linked to the U.S. and Israel.

U.S. fiscal elephantine Citigroup told its unit to evacuate offices successful the Dubai ‌International Financial Centre (DIFC) and Dubai's Oud Metha neighbourhood, a memo sent to employees which was seen by Reuters shows, telling them to enactment from location until further notice.

A spokesperson ​for the slope said it was continuing to instrumentality measures to support unit harmless and had contingency plans successful spot to guarantee concern continuity.

Britain's StanChart has a ample beingness successful the United Arab Emirates, with Dubai present a large fiscal hub for starring planetary lenders including JPMorgan and HSBC, arsenic good arsenic instrumentality firms and plus managers.

A spokesperson for StanChart declined to comment.

Separately, HSBC has closed each branches successful Qatar until further notice, according to a ‌customer notice, saying the measurement was to guarantee ⁠the information of unit and customers.

The moves came aft a spokesperson for Tehran's Khatam al-Anbiya subject bid office said connected Wednesday that Iran volition people economical and banking interests linked to the U.S. and Israel successful the ⁠region, aft an onslaught connected an Iranian bank.

An administrative gathering linked to Bank Sepah, 1 of Iran's largest nationalist banks and with humanities links to the military, was deed overnight successful Tehran, the semi-official Mehr quality bureau reported.

Many unit astatine overseas and section businesses had already been told by employers to ​work from ​home aft Iran responded to U.S. and Israeli strikes by firing missiles astatine ​targets crossed the Middle East, causing deaths, harm and ‌travel chaos.

CONFLICT DENTING DUBAI'S SAFE-HAVEN STATUS

The warfare successful the portion has dented Dubai's income transportation to planetary businesses arsenic the region's astir reliable economical hub, prompting concerns of superior flight, layoffs and firms relocating elsewhere, Reuters reported past week.

The instauration of the DIFC successful 2004 kickstarted Dubai's propulsion to gully fiscal firms.

By the extremity of 2025, DIFC hosted much than 290 banks, 102 hedge funds, 500 wealthiness absorption firms and 1,289 family-related entities, capping Dubai's decades-long modulation from a humble sportfishing larboard into a glittering planetary fiscal hub.

StanChart, which makes astir 6% of its wide income successful ‌the UAE according to institution filings, has successful caller years progressively based elder executives ​in the region.