Robert Swannell, former chairman of Marks & Spencer, who worked with Bischoff for 33 years at Schroders and later Citi, said he would profoundly mourn his friend and colleague.
Winfried Franz Wilhelm Bischoff was born in the German town of Aachen in May 1941, later moving with his family to South Africa where he was educated. Bischoff won plaudits across Wall Street and helped steer Citi through the early days of the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis, acting as interim chief executive for a month at the end of 2007, before serving as chair until January 2009.
Britain's biggest mortgage lender was then grappling with the fallout from its multi-billion pound government bailout in 2008 and faced a massive task to restructure, recapitalise and integrate its takeover of ailing rival HBOS.