Citi Maintains Dividend
Citigroup
(C) - Get Citigroup Inc. Report
on late Tuesday declared a 32-cent dividend on its common shares.
The announcement come as some relief to shareholders, who already endured a 41% cut to it dividend in January. Citi on Friday
posted a $5.1 billion first-quarter loss
and said it was slashing 9,000 jobs to cut costs.
Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Meredith Whitney, who correctly called that Citi would have to cut its dividend last fall months before it did, in February said the bank would likely have to cut its dividend further and raise more capital.
Citi is not alone among cash-starved banks resorting to cutting their dividend.
National City
(NCC)
on Monday slashed its payout and said it was raising $7 billion to shore up its capital base.
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Wachovia
(WB) - Get Weibo Corporation Report
did the same last week and
Washington Mutual
(WM) - Get Waste Management Inc. Report
earlier this year.
Bank of America
(BAC) - Get Bank of America Corporation Report
, however, on Monday said it would not cut its dividend after reporting
$1.9 billion in first-quarter writedowns
.
This article was written by a staff member of TheStreet.com.