Citigroup sheds a legacy from EMI deal by selling pension fund Citigroup has sold EMI Group's £1.5bn pension fund to the Pension Insurance Corporation, in the UK's largest pension insurance buyout. The deal rids the US bank of one legacy of the ill-fated £4.2bn takeover it backed in 2007, just as another looms. Citi, which seized control of EMI from Guy Hands" Terra Firma private equity group in February 2011, agreed to take on EMI's UK pension liabilities to facilitate the sale of the indebted music group that was home to The Beatles, Katy Perry and Coldplay. The bank announced its plan to retain the pension fund when it announced the two-part sale plan in November 2011. More than 18 months later it has now agreed to sell to PIC in a deal that covers the fund's 20,000 members. The EMI sale appeared to end the tumultuous relationship between Mr Hands and Citi, his long-term banker, which was left unable to syndicate the debt with which it financed the EMI buyout when credit markets tightened in 2007. Mr Hands sued Citi over the deal in 2010 in an effort to recoup some of the equity he lost for investors, but the three-week fraud trial ended in a victory for Citi. The two sides could be back in court again within months, however, after three federal appeals court judges overturned the verdict in May. The appeals court ruled that the judge in the original trial, Jed Rakoff, had incorrectly instructed the jury, incorrectly shifting the burden of proof from Citi to Terra Firma because of an inaccurate understanding of English law. People close to the legal process said on Tuesday that, barring a settlement, a retrial date had been set for October 7. Clive Gilchrist, chairman of the trustee company, said of the pensions deal: "I have written to the fund members telling them that their benefits have been secured in full with PIC; as a trustee, fully securing benefits is the ultimate goal." The deal is a rare recent example of a large pension buyout. There have been fewer such deals than expected because of low bond yields, which has depressed prices. Swapnil Katkar of Citi's pension solutions team, said: "We ran a disciplined process that allowed the trustee and sponsor to achieve their objectives of acquiring all risk cover on competitive terms from a leading provider. EMI was broken up after a protracted sale process, with Vivendi's Universal Music Group buying most of its recorded music business and a Sony-led consortium acquiring EMI's music publishing division. The deal, which was the focus of intense regulatory scrutiny, was eventually cleared by European antitrust authorities. The deal was passed after Universal agreed to sell off a third of EMI - including disposing of its Parlophone label to Warner Music - ending the music group's 80 years as an independent company.