Vikram Pandit waits for the day to earn over $1 per year
Wednesday, 07 April 2010, 22:31 IST   |    1 Comments
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Vikram Pandit waits for the day to earn over $1 per year
New York: Citigroup's Chief Executive, Vikram Pandit will be accepting only $1 a year in pay until his bank is consistently profitable. But his stock is rising steadily along with that of Citigroup, which climbed two percent on Monday to close at $4.26. Some of Pandit's most trusted advisers notice a new bounce in his step and say he is more energetic at meetings. "He has a smile on his face. He sees the day when he is going to earn more than a $1 a year," said one top lieutenant to New York Times. With unemployment still high, losses tied to Citigroup's mortgage and credit card businesses have continued to climb that day may still be months away. New financial rules, still being determined in Washington, could dampen profits further. Even so, with the markets and the economy overall on the rebound, Citigroup could beat Wall Street's break-even consensus estimate and turn an operating profit for the first quarter. Slowly, Citigroup is breaking with its troubled past. Indeed, when the Financial Inquiry Crisis Commission begins hearings this week on Citigroup's near collapse, the panel will focus not on Pandit but on his predecessors: the former chief executive Charles Prince III and Robert Rubin, an influential board member and adviser. Pandit has substantially shrunk Citigroup's giant balance sheet. It now stands at $1.86 trillion, down about $500 billion, or 21 percent, from its pre-crisis peak. Much of that reduction has come from Citi Holdings, a unit set up in early 2009 that contains the businesses and assets that Pandit hopes to sell. Even in a buyer's market, he has reduced its size to $447 billion, from $662 billion last year - without having to sell at steep discounts.

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