Hai sa jucam fotbal!
Let’s play soccer, America, because the Treasury’s bailout of Citi makes us all sponsors – of Romania’s top- rated team, Steaua Bukarest.
Taxpayers are now liable for some $306 billion in Citigroup’s toxic holdings, as well as a $45 billion direct investment in the ailing bank.
In exchange for $1.6 million a year, the players on Steaua Bukarest sport Citibank jerseys.
Citigroup insists these sponsorships, including the bank’s $400 million support for the Mets’ new Citi Field, are an integral part of its marketing plan.
“In these challenging times, we have to work even harder to grow our business,” said bank flack Steve Silverman.
Critics like Richard Ferlauto, director of corpo rate governance and pension investments with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, disagree.
“They just don’t get it,” Ferlauto fumed. “Wall Street bankers think they are so elite that they are immune.”
Even as the embattled bank cuts 53,000 jobs, it will keep swinging at golf with a $10 million, three-year sponsorship of the PGA Tour. It also maintains a Citi golf team and will sponsor the 2010 Ryder Cup in South Wales.
Ferlauto conceded the bank’s sports sponsorships, at least, are better than rewarding “the per formance” of executives “who don’t have a plan to run the company.”