Welfare Queens Gone Wild update: More shenanigans at $hiti Citi

[marmar]

Citigroup Said to Pay $13 Million for Scrapped Resort Trips
By Josh Fineman


March 9 (Bloomberg) -- Citigroup Inc., the recipient of $45 billion in government rescue funds, doled out $13 million as compensation to employees whose trips to resorts the company was forced to scrap, two people familiar with the matter said.

Citigroup paid 1,900 agents of its Primerica Financial Services Inc. unit $5,000 each for missing a three-day stay at a Bahamas resort, the people said, speaking anonymously because the amounts aren’t public. Some 2,000 Smith Barney brokerage advisers got debit cards valued at $1,000, $2,000 and $3,000 for various canceled getaways.

President Barack Obama warned last month that companies receiving government bailout money “can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayers’ dime.” Bank of America Corp., which like Citigroup has accepted $45 billion from the government, last month moved a health-care conference to New York from Las Vegas.

Primerica paid the agents, who are mainly independent contractors, because they won a seven-month-long sales contest, the company said. “We were legally obligated to do so,” Susan Thomson, a Citi Holdings spokeswoman said. Primerica and Smith Barney, both profitable businesses, are part of Citi Holdings, a new unit of Citigroup.

Smith Barney paid the brokers because “in the most aggressive recruiting environments in the history of our industry, we need to reward, retain and develop the best employees of these profitable Citi businesses,” Thomson said. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a5_f5rPe0U48&refer=home

[xchrom]

1. ...

:grr: :nuke: :grr:

i see this -- then i think about layoffs that are happening -- and it just boggles.

[Spinzonner]

2. Citi has a profitable Business ?

Only if you slice and dice it finely enough, apparently