Citibank’s CEO and President Both Resign [1]

President and COO John P. Havens has also resigned from his post.

Michael Corbat [5], a veteran CEO of the Middle East, Europe and Africa, will take over as the new CEO. He’s a graduate of Harvard and also worked at Salomon Brothers.

This comes as a major surprise even to employees at Citi, CNBC’s Kate Kelly reports, and the reason for Pandit’s resignation is unknown [6] although WSJ is reporting that there were clashes with the board [7].

WSJ reported back in August [8] that succession planning was under way at Citi, and that Corbat was a strong candidate, but even that report said a change was not imminent.

Furthermore, shock resignations like this (especially resigning that day) are just not usually done, and don’t inspire investor confidence.

Citi’s share price is down 2 percent on the news. Yesterday, the bank’s earnings beat expectations [9], so that just adds to the shock.

Pandit was, in general, a pretty controversial CEO. Former FDIC chair Sheila Bair [10] was outspoken in her criticism of him as a leader in her book, “Bull by the Horns [11].” There have been internal problems as well. This year Citi’s shareholders voted against Pandit’s compensation package [12] — not a good sign that your board has confidence that you’re doing the best job possible.

The press release is below and it includes a bio of Corbat so you can check that out below as well.

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Read the rest of the article here: Business Insider [3]