Citigroup has resumed an advisory role for WestLB, the German bank it helped offload some of its principal investments last year, after handling the €1.25bn ($1.6bn) sale of the German bank's stake in HSH Nordbank.

JC Flowers, the private equity firm run by ex-Goldman Sachs banker Christopher Flowers, won the auction for the stake, beating alternative investment firm Cerberus Capital Management in an auction for the second time in a year.