Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/citigroup-to-cut-jobs-sell-assets-in-financial-crunch Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript Citigroup announced plans Monday to cut 53,000 jobs worldwide as a result of the worsening global fiscal crisis and large company losses. Roben Farzad of Business Week assesses the financial institution's troubles and how other banks are faring. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. GWEN IFILL: We begin with the continuing fallout of the financial crisis and economic downturn here and abroad. Jeffrey Brown has our two-part look at the latest developments. JEFFREY BROWN: And we start on the domestic front with today's announcement of a giant job cutback by Citigroup, the latest round of layoffs to hit the financial industry.With us to discuss the news is Roben Farzad, senior writer and columnist for BusinessWeek magazine.Well, Roben, we're all well aware that the financial sector is troubled, but remind us of the specific case of Citigroup. What led to cutting 53,000 jobs? ROBEN FARZAD, Editor, BusinessWeek: Well, to take a term from the McKenzie vernacular, Citigroup is really trying desperately to right-side its business, this being one of the most complicated financial institutions in the world in perhaps the most complicated operating environment for Wall Street since the Great Depression.So you layer one layer above another layer of complexity, and they are racing to figure out, what's the right kind of workforce for a diminished revenue opportunity in this brave new world? JEFFREY BROWN: Are its troubles different from other large banks and investment banks or more of the same that we've been talking about for the last few months? ROBEN FARZAD: Some same and some different. Some are certainly peculiar to Citi. You recall that Citigroup was formed through the gigantic merger of Citibank and Travelers Group in 1998. That was Sandy Weill's masterstroke.Really, the verdict's out. That acquisition never worked. And certainly the stock has round-tripped back to below where it stood 10 years ago when that merger was consummated.And the bank has had an enormously difficult time integrating all the disparate software systems and back office systems and all these other things, kind of the mundane blocking and tackling of these mega-mergers that it partook in for the past 10 years. But then you get this unprecedented financial crisis and the tens of billions of dollars of subprime securities that it binged on with borrowed money turn out to be valued at a fraction of what Citi imagined.