Posted on 02/22/2009 6:51:24 PM PST by Jim Robinson
A new Citigroup scandal is engulfing Robert Rubin and his former disciple Chuck Prince for their roles in an alleged Ponzi-style scheme that's now choking world banking.
Director Rubin and ousted CEO Prince - and their lieutenants over the past five years - are named in a federal lawsuit for an alleged complex cover-up of toxic securities that spread across the globe, wiping out trillions of dollars in their destructive paths.
Investor-plaintiffs in the suit accuse Citi management of overseeing the repackaging of unmarketable collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) that no one wanted - and then reselling them to Citi and hiding the poisonous exposure off the books in shell entities.
The lawsuit said that when the bottom fell out of the shaky assets in the past year, Citi's stock collapsed, wiping out more than $122 billion of shareholder value.
However, Rubin and other top insiders were able to keep Citi shares afloat until they could cash out more than $150 million for themselves in "suspicious" stock sales "calculated to maximize the personal benefits from undisclosed inside information," the lawsuit said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Oh boy, fire up the solar panels for some popcorn.
THIS IS GONNA GET GOOD!!!!
This could be REALLY good.
A true culture of corruption with the Democrats, that is for sure.
Sounds to me like two strong candidates to run major branches of the Democrat government.
I guess we’ll see if Rahm is as teflon-coated as Obama.
time for some serious perp walks...
Wasn’t Rubin one of Bomba’s advisors?
Any progress on this suit?
Yup I hope they give the scrawney lil bastard a huge SMACKDOWN!!!
Oops, I mean Rubin.
Another Citi exec headed to be US Ambassador to the UK:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article5780720.ece
Louis Susman, big Obama fundraiser/bundler and just retired Vice Chair of Citi Global Markets.
The fresh air from the Obama admin is just stifling.
Robert Edward Rubin (born August 29, 1938) served as the 70th United States Secretary of the Treasury during both the first and second Clinton administrations. Before his government service, he spent 26 years at Goldman Sachs. His most prominent post-government role was as Director and Senior Counselor of Citigroup, where he performed ongoing advisory and representational roles for the firm[1]. From November to December 2007, he served temporarily as Chairman of Citigroup.[2][3] On January 9, 2009 Citigroup announced his resignation, after having been criticized for his performance.[4] He received more than $126 million in cash and stock during his eight years at Citigroup.[4]
Seems that DemocRat corruption is all over this meltdown!
Pray for America and Our Troops
He was reasury sec under Bubba!
Robert Rubin’s disciples dominate Obama economic team
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/11/24/business/rubin.php
Obama’s economic team shows influence of Robert Rubin - with a difference
Published: November 24, 2008
WASHINGTON: It is testament to the star power of former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin among many Democrats that as Barack Obama fills out his economic team, a virtual Rubin constellation is taking shape.
The president-elect used the announcement Monday that he was appointing two Rubin protégés, Timothy Geithner as Treasury secretary and Lawrence Summers as senior White House economic adviser, to underscore his determination to step aggressively into a economic leadership vacuum in Washington while also maintaining continuity with the Bush administration before the transition of power Jan. 20.
Obama is expected to soon announce the appointment of another Rubin protégé, Peter Orszag, as White House budget director. And even the headhunters for Obama have Rubin ties: Michael Froman, who was Rubin’s chief of staff in the Treasury Department and followed him to Citigroup, and James Rubin, Robert Rubin’s son.
Geithner, Summers and Orszag have all been followers of the economic formula that came to be called Rubinomics: balanced budgets, free trade and financial deregulation.
(snip)
Enron The Sequel...coming to a courtroom near you soon.
That’s odd, nothing about party affiliation in the article. Hmmm...guess that means Rubin is a libertarian.
THANKS....thought so
Some wiki:
Robert Rubin served as the 70th United States Secretary of the Treasury during both the first and second Clinton administrations.
Upon Rubin’s retirement, Clinton called him the “greatest secretary of the Treasury since Alexander Hamilton.” “During his tenure as Treasury Secretary,” Senator Chuck Hagel (R-NE) said, “Bob was an ideal public servant who put policy before politics.”
In 1997, together with then-Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, Rubin strongly opposed the regulation of derivatives, when such regulation was proposed by then-head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), Brooksley Born. Overexposure to credit derivatives of mortgage-backed securities was a key reason for the failure of US financial institutions Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, American International Group, and Washington Mutual in 2008.
According to the New York Times, “In November 1999, senior regulators—including Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Rubin—recommended that Congress permanently strip the CFTC of regulatory authority over derivatives.”[9] This advice was accepted and derivatives were kept clear of regulation by the CFTC.
January 9, 2009 Citigroup announced his resignation, after having been criticized for his performance. He received more than $126 million in cash and stock during his eight years at Citigroup.
Rubin has been touted as a possible appointee to a cabinet post for President Barack Obama. Rubin, alongside Austan Goolsbee and Paul Volcker, is one of Obama’s economic advisers.
Robert Rubin received over $17,000,000 in compensation from Citigroup and a further $33,000,000 in stock options as of 2008.
Rubin sparked controversy in 2001 when he contacted an acquaintance at the Treasury Department and asked if the department could convince bond-rating agencies not to downgrade the corporate debt of Enron, a debtor of Citigroup. Rubin wanted Enron creditors to lend money to the troubled company for a restructuring of its debt; a collapse of the energy giant might have serious consequences for financial markets and energy distribution. The Treasury official refused. A subsequent congressional staff investigation cleared Rubin of any wrongdoing, but he was still harshly criticized by political opponents.
In January 2009, Rubin was named by Marketwatch as one of the “10 most unethical people in business”
Remember the 1970's hippie expression of "QUESTION AUTHORITY"?
Now with PC run amock we will have UNQUESTIONABLE AUTHORITY!!!
this will never see the light of day. Rubin has far too many friends inside the administration.
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