Citigroup chief executive Vikram Pandit has rejected the idea of big banks being split up, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.

Vikram Pandit said Citi, formed through mergers such as the acquisition of Travelers in 1998, had already gone back to the basics of banking, and had sold most of the units from that deal.

"What's left here is essentially the old Citicorp. That's a tried and proven strategy. Why did it work? Because it was a strategy based upon operating the business and serving clients and not a strategy based on dealmaking. That's the fundamental difference," he is quoted as saying.

He said Citi took almost 50 per cent of its business from emerging markets and was "banking on the fact that the growth story is intact" for Asia and the southern hemisphere broadly, despite the slowdown in China.