Business

WEILL PITCHES IN

With its fortunes crumbling, Citigroup has received a helping hand from a figure from the past.

The banking giant’s former chairman and CEO, Sanford Weill, has agreed to give up millions of dollars in perks he has received since stepping down in April 2006, the company said yesterday.

“Mr. Weill came to Citi voluntarily in August 2008 to end his consulting agreement, which included access to Citigroup facilities and services comparable to what he received as chairman and CEO,” said Citigroup spokeswoman Shannon Bell. “Citi and Mr. Weill mutually agreed to end those benefits in April 2009.”

Weill, 75, has received around $3 million a year from the company in pension, consulting fees, tax compensation and other perks.

But he and his wife also receive full medical and dental coverage, life insurance, a company car and driver and use of the company’s private jets. Citi also was paying for Weill’s swanky private office in the General Motors Building.

Use of company jets has been a thorny issue for Citi. The hobbled bank just canceled the purchase of a $50 million luxury jet amid a public outcry since the company has gotten billions in taxpayer-footed rescue money.

But even before then, Weill’s use of a company plane caused such a public stir that he agreed to limit his use after being retired for six years and to give up access after 10 years.

Weill also walked away with 16.6 million shares in company stock plus options for 4 million more. At the time, it was all worth nearly $800 million, but is now worth just about one-tenth of that since the company’s recent near collapse.

While the compensation package is modest compared with some of the more outrageous “golden-parachute” deals that some executives have gotten, Weill’s send-off probably would have gotten more scrutiny, given it would be the taxpayer who would have been on the hook.

Weill did not return several calls for comment.

He worked for Citigroup for more than 20 years and served as its CEO through 2003, and its chairman through 2006.

Since then, he has run his family’s foundation out of a swank Midtown office in the GM Building at Fifth Avenue between 58th and 59th streets, across the street from Central Park and the Plaza.

It is also a stone’s throw from the $42 million, full-floor apartment with 2,000 square feet of terrace space that he bought in the city’s toniest building at 15 Central Park West.

According to Forbes Magazine, Weill was the 377th richest person in America in 2008, with a net worth of $1.3 billion. That’s down from the 242nd richest in 2006, when he was worth $1.5 billion.

In its 2007 tax filing, Weill’s charitable organization – The Weill Family Foundation – listed $242 million in assets.