Dreading a Prince of a Year From Citi

Chicanery in the executive office. Most poorly performing major bank stock. A strategy of overpaying overseas and firing people domestically. A reputation for being Goldman Sachs' (GS - commentary - Cramer's Take) best ally, because he's so bad. A caretaker put in to appease Eliot Spitzer, who is now in Albany with bigger fish to fry.

These are the traits that should have led to the firing of Chuck Prince from Citigroup (C - commentary - Cramer's Take) by now. There's some dispute about whether the potential firing would come from Prince Alwaleed, who has 4% of the shares.

That's the wrong call. If Chuck Prince is to go -- and his departure is integral to any rally that can ever occur, as we have seen from the lackluster response to the so-called big restructuring/head-count reduction -- the board will have to take action.

That means we have to look at the board members. Do they have what it takes to make the right move? Not clear. Some people certainly would be intolerant of such poor performance, but others might be willing to take no action by virtue of their own intransigence or lack of sophistication about the way Wall Street works.

First, the good news. I can't imagine board member Kenneth Derr, a man who built Chevron (CVX - commentary - Cramer's Take) into a tremendous oil powerhouse, being endlessly patient. Bob Rubin, who may have had a hand in Prince's appointment, could have a problem reversing his own thinking, yet I think that he's too rigorous to let this poor performance go on endlessly.

And then there's George David, a man simply intolerant of anything less than 110% and who was acutely aware of the value he created at United Technologies (UTX - commentary - Cramer's Take). He could be the real catalyst for change.

But then there's the bad, starting with the notoriously underperforming, actually embarrassing exec Michael Armstrong. Dreadful. This man drove AT&T (T - commentary - Cramer's Take) into the ground. I think he would tolerate any amount of underperformance. He might not even care.

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