Citigroup investment bankers could see their fat cat bonuses clawed back by the US financial giant if a group of former staffers get their way.
Ex-Citi executives fired off a five-page missive to the firm’s board demanding that they cancel the eye-popping payouts for hundreds of managers as part of CEO Jane Fraser’s turnaround plan, according to a report by Bloomberg.
The angry bankers are also demanding the Scottish-born executive slash last year’s $300 million spend on external consultants by 50% to boost the company’s bottom line.
A Citi investor presentation from January that shows that figure is already well below the $700 million splashed out in the two years previously.
The anonymous authors said they represent ten former managing directors who say they are out of pocket by more than $12 million in deferred compensations that it is tied to Citi’s stock price.
The price of a share in the major bank cost $64.19 on the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday afternoon, compared to $68.49 when Fraser took up the top job on March 1, 2021.
By contrast, the price of Goldman Sachs stock is $519.65 while JPMorgan’s share price sits at $222.76.
She was appointed a year after a ‘fat finger’ error in 2020 saw the bank accidentally wire $900 million in interest payments to the lenders of cosmetics company Revlon.
The sum was more than 100 times the intended amount and drew scorn from investors who had long complained about the lender’s bloated bureaucracy and headcount.
Fraser announced a strategy to revive profits last year in which she vowed to cut 20,000 jobs and simplify the firm’s business processes.
Her tenure has also been mired in a string of sexual harassment scandals, sparking accusations that she has failed to tackle the bank’s allegedly toxic working environment.
Managing director Ardith Lindsey is suing Citi over allegations that the firm’s headquarters was a “notoriously hostile” environment for women.
But 2023 was also a bumper payday for the 57-year-old. Her salary jumped by about 6% to $26 million last year, according to regulatory filings.
Fraser’s current package includes a base salary of $1.5 million, cash bonus of $3.7 million and $20.8 million in deferred performance-linked stock.
Chief financial officer Mark Mason and chief operating officer Anand Selvakesari each raked in a total of just over $14 million last year, filings show.
The former Citi bankers blasted the payouts as “unwarranted” in their letter.
They claimed that it “reflects longstanding internal loyalties to Fraser rather than the type of independent thinking, managerial execution and strategic redirection needed by Citi at this critical time.”
“This anonymous letter contains a multitude of factual inaccuracies and a range of misguided statements that we strongly contest,” a spokesperson for Citigroup said.
“We acknowledge that our stakeholders want to see us make progress as quickly as possible; we share that objective and are making the tough decisions to make that happen.”
“Transformations of this scale are not linear and they inevitably attract criticism from those who would approach the effort differently or who ignore the progress we have made. And they often result in colleague departures, some intentional and some regrettable.”
