Citigroup, Inc. (NYSE: C) has gone below $5 a share which triggers the dreaded sell-off by institutional investors who are not allowed to own stocks that trade below that level. And rumors of Vikram Pandit's departure from the CEO role are beginning to accumulate.

Unfortunately, the Credit Default Swap (CDS) market is now also kicking in. When this happens, it generally means that a company needs to come up with lots of cash to continue to insure its bonds. And since Tuesday, the CDS premium for Citi bonds rose 55% -- the annual cost of protecting $10 million of Citi debt against default for five years rose to $410,000 on Wednesday from $265,000 on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, CNBC's Charlie Gasparino claims that "the market is betting that Vikram Pandit's days are over." And with Citi just announcing that it will move up its quarterly reporting date from the 22nd to the 16th, the bad news should be out soon. I am sorry to say that it looks like the value of Citi's equity is about to hit bottom and never recover.

Peter Cohan is president of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and is the author of You Can't Order Change: Lessons from Jim McNerney's Turnaround at Boeing. He owns Citi shares.

Another "respected" American company looks to be in a bit of financial trouble. You'll recall that Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS) recently received a $5 billion capital infusion from Warren Buffett. And today, the once-admired General Electric Company (NYSE: GE) accepted a $3 billion check from Buffett in exchange for preferred stock paying a 10% dividend and warrants to buy $3 billion common shares of GE at a strike price of $22.25 for five years.

This comes as the Credit Default Swap (CDS) market is charging GE a rapidly rising premium to insure its bonds. CDSs protecting against a default by GE Capital Corp. for five years climbed as much as 1.25 percentage points to 7.4% -- and last traded at 7%. This increase in perceived risk is happening as GE suspended its stock buyback, shifting capital to protect its dividend and AAA credit rating.

Will these moves be enough to protect GE's credit rating or is getting 40% of its pretax profit from financial services too risky? Who will be the next company to be stricken by this financial crisis? And which of these weak companies will pay this steep price for Warren Buffett's money?

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter. He owns GE shares and has no financial interest in Goldman shares..

Last weekend, the U.S. government decided that it would let Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (NYSE: LEH) fail -- leading to history's biggest bankruptcy -- valued at $639 billion. But that was fine because the government said that people knew Lehman was in trouble. Of course, people also knew since August 2007 that Bear Stearns was in trouble, but that didn't stop the government from forking over $29 billion of taxpayer money to bail it out. And people knew for years that Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) were in trouble -- but that did not stop the US from pledging between $200 billion and $800 billion to nationalize them.

But this morning, we discover that the government has crossed over the line in the sand it drew over the weekend -- it will loan $85 billion of taxpayer money -- at a variable interest rate starting at 14.5% -- Libor, which doubled yesterday from roughly 3% to 6%, plus 8.5% according to the Wall Street Journal [subscription required] -- to avoid what would have been the $1 trillion bankruptcy of American International Group (NYSE: AIG). In exchange for this two year loan, according to the New York Times, the Fed gets as collateral all the $1 trillion of AIG's assets plus warrants to purchase 80% of AIG stock.

The incompetence of this government is breathtaking. On Sunday, it could have loaned AIG $40 billion to keep its credit rating from getting downgraded. It refused to do so -- trying to force JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) and Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS) to help raise private financing -- and credit agencies went ahead and downgraded AIG on Monday. Now, instead of a bridge loan which would have tided AIG over until it could sell some assets to raise capital, the government is making a two-year loan that is twice as big. And we, the taxpayers, are likely to own this pile of assets that may be worth far less than the $1 trillion stated on its books. If there's any good news, the stated collateral is more than 10 times the amount of the loan.

Bloomberg News reports that Moody's (NYSE: MCO) may downgrade municipal bond insurer MBIA (NYSE: MBI) after it reported deepening losses from the mortgage-market slump. MBIA's insurance financial strength rating may fall to the Aa range, although a drop to the A category is possible. MBIA's stock is down 91% since the end of May 2007.

That's when I first suggested that investors consider selling MBIA shares short. William Ackman had already shorted MBIA because he thought it lacked the capital needed to support its obligations. Back then, MBIA traded at $66.59 a share -- today it's down to $5.88. His bet proved prescient.

Meanwhile, investors are wagering that MBIA won't make it. Credit-default swaps tied to MBIA's insurance unit rose to a record as investors hedged against the risk the company's guarantees will sour. Sellers of five-year contracts demanded 23% upfront and 5% a year. That's up from 18.5% initially and 5% a year yesterday.

Only $5.88 more to go.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter. He has no financial interest in MBIA securities.

It is shaping up to be another tough day for the market as traders continue to express concerns over a possible recession, disappointing earnings numbers, surging crude oil prices and persistent weakness for the U.S. dollar. However, not all the companies are joining the general market anxiety, and Swiss Re made strong gains, trading up 4.9% in the Zurich exchange, despite a plunge of 87% in its fourth-quarter net profit as investors were encouraged by its positive earnings outlook.

The world's largest reinsurer announced that its quarterly profit had dropped to 170 million Swiss francs ($161.7 million), dragged down by higher write-downs related to bad loans. Its profit numbers were down from 1.3 billion reported in the same period a year ago.