Cramer on BloggingStocks: Citi must tear down Prince's kingdom

Posted Nov 5th 2007 8:00AM by Jim Cramer
Filed under: Management, Time Warner (TWX), Citigroup Inc. (C), Cramer on BloggingStocks

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says getting rid of the CEO was a good first step, but more must be done to turn things around.

The temptation is to say that getting rid of Chuck Prince is too little, too late for this once-great bank. But that's just not true. What needs to be done is a quick dismantling of everything that Prince has done -- his worldwide acquisition of assets, including everything in Japan, as well as the fast shedding of these hedge funds.

More important, whoever runs the place has to sell things that have simply accumulated over the years. Of course, some of this will have to resemble a fire sale -- think like what Dick Parsons, a Citi (NYSE: C) (Cramer's Take) board member, had to do at Time Warner (NYSE: TWX) (Cramer's Take) to save that.

In the end, though, a deposit base so vast can be harvested, and a bank with so many pieces can pick a path -- credit card and savings bank? -- that can be lucrative.

Of course the losses are hideous. Of course the losses are probably bigger than acknowledged. Prince was not smart enough to understand things like exposure, and his myriad lieutenants never had the discipline or intellect to see the dangers.

That's all past.

Would I buy the stock?

I own it.

No such choice.

Jim Cramer is a director and co-founder of TheStreet.com. He contributes daily market commentary for TheStreet.com's sites and serves as an adviser to the company's CEO. At the time of publication, Cramer was long Citigroup.

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Tags: C, Chuck Prince, ChuckPrince, Citi, Citigroup, James Cramer, JamesCramer, Jim Cramer, JimCramer, management

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

11-05-2007 @ 9:11AM

Mort said...

Looks like Cramer is STUCK owning Citi! What giant mess the company is in!

11-05-2007 @ 10:05AM

richard cook said...

Anything Sandy Weil has been involved with has a patina of filth on it.

11-05-2007 @ 3:35PM

ALAISTAIR said...

What Cramer won't tell you is Citibank, Merrill Lynch, and countless other Wall Street institutions are finished. They hold so much in worthless securities, when they fail, and they will, they become the single greatest threat to the solvency of the American banking system since the Great Depression. By the way, welcome to Bush and Bernanke's slide into economic ruin while the CNBC hucksters try to get the rest of us to buy their worthless financial stocks.

11-05-2007 @ 11:38AM

diane said...

Would you sell? I have investment units in C...50,000 invested paying a monthly return of 417...........each month..........Should I wait out the storm?