John Thain Will Mend CIT, Poll Says

Thain will receive a base salary of $500,000, as well as $5.5 million in stock annually, $2.5 million of which will be subject to a one-year holding period. The other $3 million cannot be sold for three years. Thain is also eligible to receive up to $1.5 million in bonuses based on the performance of the company.

Thain previously served as the CEO of the New York Stock Exchange, and as president and chief operating officer at Goldman Sachs(GS).

Thain began his career at Goldman as a corporate-finance associate and steadily scaled the investment-banking side of the company; he was named head of the mortgage desk from 1984 to 1990, and was president and COO from 1999 to 2004.

Notably, Thain, in 1988, was Goldman's representative on the Long-Term Capital Management board and was involved in constructing the bailout of L.T.C.M. orchestrated by the Federal Reserve -- experience that might not prove unhelpful in regards to attempted to fix the ails of CIT.

In our weekly poll, 55.2% of the respondents said Thain would be able to mend the fragile company. This might comes as a surprise to many, as Thain has his own tarnished image to repair.

Thain, facilitated the sale of Merrill to Bank of America(BAC) back in 2008, but was then kicked out after the deal closed.

At the time, Thain was criticized for doling out $3.6 billion in bonuses to Merrill employees right before the deal closed. He also reportedly spent $1 million to redecorate his office.

For these -- and presumably many other reasons, ones likely having to do with the macro-economic challenges facing an institutional lender during the most perilous economic recovery of several generation -- about 44.8% said Thain will be unsuccessful at the job.

-- Reported by Jeanine Poggi in New York.

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