CIT Group
FeedStocks in the news: Ford, Humana, CIT Group, Human Genome
Melly Alazraki
Nov 2nd 2009 at 9:00AM
Filed under: Company News, Investing, CIT Group, Fannie Mae, Ford Motor Co., General Electric , Goldman Sachs , Loews, Boeing, Bank of America, Wal-Mart Stores, Comcast, Human Genome, GlaxoSmithKline
Wall Street ready to rebound after CIT's bankruptcy, Ford's profit
Melly Alazraki
Nov 2nd 2009 at 7:40AM
Filed under: Economy, Investing, CIT Group, Ford Motor Co.
U.S. stocks are poised to bounce back Monday morning, ready to start November on a solid note following Friday's sharp selloff. The week ahead is full of earnings and economic data releases, including the Federal Reserve policy meeting.On Friday, markets dropped some 2.5 percent as the fate of CIT Group (CIT) hung in balance and the strength of the economic recovery, and with it the markets' rally, questioned. On Sunday, CIT finally filed for bankruptcy protection.
More here: Before the bell: Stocks futures point to a solid start after CIT's failure, Ford's earnings
Why CIT Group's bankruptcy doesn't matter
Peter Cohan
Nov 1st 2009 at 5:45PM
Filed under: CIT Group, Goldman Sachs , Citigroup
I would like to congratulate the Obama administration for drawing the right line in the sand. Unlike the Bush administration, Obama did not permit a $639 billion bankruptcy -- Lehman Brothers -- whose collapse nearly caused social chaos as people lost confidence in their money market funds. With today's CIT Group (CIT) bankruptcy filing, the U.S. will lose $2.3 billion in TARP money, but with $71 billion in assets, CIT will keep operating and global panic will not follow.
As I posted previously, CIT Group makes loans to about a million small businesses like Dunkin' Brands franchises. Those businesses need capital to operate and they can't get it very easily by accessing public debt and equity markets. So lenders like CIT Group really matter to them. But the company got distracted by subprime mortgages and student loans and it is likely to scale back to its core business of lending to small and medium sized business.
CIT files bankruptcy, $2.3 billion in taxpayer funds likely lost
Sam Gustin
Nov 1st 2009 at 5:05PM
Filed under: Company News, CIT Group
CIT Group, the giant small business lender, filed for a "pre-packaged bankruptcy" Sunday night carrying some $71 billion in assets, after last ditch attempts to avert such an outcome failed. The development will keep the doors open at the 101-year-old small business lender, but there will be heavy losses, including, most likely, $2.3 billion in taxpayer bailout funds.CIT survived the Great Depression, but it couldn't weather the Great Recession. Its demise may be a sign that the wave of crumbling, sub-prime mortgage-infected financial giants has not ceased.
CIT Group receives $1 billion loan from Icahn
AP
Oct 30th 2009 at 6:20PM
Filed under: Company News, CIT Group
Commercial lender CIT Group Inc. said Friday that billionaire investor and bondholder Carl Icahn agreed to support the company's restructuring plan amid reports CIT may soon file for bankruptcy protection.Icahn also agreed to provide CIT with a $1 billion line of credit.
Icahn has been an outspoken critic in recent weeks of New York-based CIT Group's plan to restructure its debt in an effort to avoid collapse. CIT, one of the largest lenders to small and midsize businesses, has been trying to reduce its near-term debt burden by $5.7 billion.
Another wicked October takes its toll on investor confidence
David Schepp
Oct 30th 2009 at 4:30PM
Filed under: Company News, Economy, Earnings, CIT Group, Apple, Citigroup
Slipping consumer confidence sent U.S. stocks tumbling Friday, nearly ending a six-month-long sprint that saw major indexes climb steadily and dramatically in the face of recession. The drop, on the last trading day of a wildly volatile October, capped a month of stock-price swings that whipsawed investors as the markets raced between wins and losses in response to positive then negative economic news.Friday's sell-off was spurred by a disappointing Commerce Department report showing a 0.5 percent drop in consumer spending last month. The bad news was further bolstered by a University of Michigan survey that showed Americans were less optimistic about the economy in October than in the previous month. Stocks reacted dramatically, erasing all gains made Thursday, when markets rallied in response to a strong third-quarter GDP report.
Brian Tierney's time, money, luck slipping away from his Philly news empire
Jonathan Berr
Oct 22nd 2009 at 5:30PM
Filed under: Company News, People, Media, CIT Group, Dow Chemical
After leading an investment team to buy The Philadelphia Inquirer in 2006, Brian P. Tierney invited the widow of its onetime owner, Walter Annenberg, to visit him in her husband's old office. While visiting, Lenore Annenberg noted that Tierney had situated his desk differently from her husband.Tierney moved his desk. "I want all the good vibes, good ideas, I can get," Tierney told Philadelphia magazine.
Carl Icahn aims both barrels at CIT's board
Tim Catts
Oct 19th 2009 at 4:40PM
Filed under: Company News, CIT Group
Billionaire financier Carl Icahn pulled no punches on Monday in a scathing open letter to the board of CIT Group (CIT). The foundering century-old lender "shamelessly" offered to sell big bondholders $6 billion in loans to the company at "well below fair market value," all to the detriment of smaller investors, Icahn alleged. To the feared corporate raider and distressed-debt investor, it's the last in a long line of perceived insults by CIT's board. And paving the way for their removal, it would appear, is one of the main motivations behind his offer to extend his own $6 billion loan that he says would be cheaper and come with fewer strings attached.
Carl Icahn throws CIT a $6 billion lifeline
AP
Oct 19th 2009 at 10:40AM
Filed under: Company News, CIT Group
Billionaire investor Carl Icahn offered a $6 billion lifeline to struggling lender CIT Group Inc. (CIT).In a letter Monday to CIT's board of directors, Icahn said he would give the company the loan to replace a debt restructuring plan CIT has submitted to its bondholders for approval.
Icahn, who is a CIT bondholder, said in his letter the $6 billion loan would save the company $150 million in fees. He also criticized the board for pushing an exchange offer that he said unfairly favors large bondholders at the expense of smaller investors and that also undervalues the company.
CIT presses new plan to avoid bankrutcy
Douglas McIntyre
Oct 18th 2009 at 9:15AM
Filed under: Company News, CIT Group
CIT Group (CIT) shareholders have had a wild ride for the last five months. They've had to deal with concerns about bankruptcy, threats from its bondholders and plans for the firm's future as the CEO announced he was stepping down. CIT stock traded near $4 in early June. Since then, it dropped to 41 cents on July 15, when it looked like the company wouldn't make it, and has gyrated between that low and a recent price of $2.20. Shares closed at $1.12 on Oct. 16.
Is Jeffrey Peek stepping down from CIT to keep the company alive?
Lita Epstein
Oct 13th 2009 at 1:45PM
Filed under: Company News, Economy, CIT Group
CIT Group (CIT) chairman and CEO Jeffrey Peek announced today that he plans to retire on December 31. The announcement comes right in the middle of closed-door negotiations as CIT tries to get bondholders to accept a massive debt swap or a prepackaged bankruptcy. If both options fail, CIT will head into a Chapter 11 filing from which it may never exit.Peek announced these negotiations just two weeks ago; Bloomberg.com reported on October 2 that bondholders seeking to avoid collapse were putting together a $6 billion bailout package to help finance a prepackaged bankruptcy if the debt exchange fails. The new package would have lower interest rates than the original loans' 13 percent annual rate. But that week has come and gone, and the deal appears not to have been worked out.
Stocks in the news: Johnson & Johnson, Goldman Sachs, CIT Group
Melly Alazraki
Oct 13th 2009 at 9:00AM
Filed under: Company News, Investing, Earnings, CIT Group, Goldman Sachs , Intel, Johnson & Johnson, American International Group, INC., Bank of America
Johnson & Johnson's (JNJ) profit increased 1 percent in the third-quarter to beat analyst estimates despite competition from generics that hurt its sales. J&J earned $3.35 billion in the quarter, or $1.20 per share. Revenue fell 5 percent to $15.08 billion, just shy of expectations. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial were expecting earnings of $1.13 per share on revenue of $15.19 billion. Shares fell nearly 2 percent ahead of the bell.
Goldman Sachs (GS) shares this morning fell nearly 2 percent in pre-market trading after it earned itself a downgrade from banking analyst extraordinaire Meredith Whitney, who downgraded Goldman to Neutral from Buy. Jim Cramer doesn't necessarily agree she deserves the Street's cred. Goldman Sachs reports earnings Thursday.
If CIT fails, Goldman wins -- with a $1 billion payoff
Peter Cohan
Oct 5th 2009 at 10:50AM
Filed under: CIT Group, Goldman Sachs
Goldman Sachs Group (GS) doesn't provide much detail on how it racks up billions of trading profits every quarter. But if you look at how it made out on American International Group's (AIG) failure -- a $12.9 billion check from taxpayers -- you start to get the idea. Goldman has engineered the world so it wins no matter what. That's why Goldman is also set to profit -- to the tune of $1 billion, according to Bloomberg -- from the failure of another borrower, CIT Group (CIT).
Before checking into Goldman's latest head-I-win, tails-you-lose deal let's review what happened with AIG, which the U.S. took over last fall because then-Treasury Secretary and former Goldman CEO Hank Paulson decided that the government needed to bail out Goldman's credit default swap (CDS) exposure to AIG at 100 cents on the dollar and keep it secret. Unfortunately, Paulson's efforts at secrecy failed, and we learned that Goldman got $12.9 billion and that foreign banks got billions more.
Stocks in the news: Bank of America, Brocade, CIT Group
Jonathan Berr
Oct 5th 2009 at 9:15AM
Filed under: Investing, CIT Group, Hewlett-Packard, Bank of America
Some of the companies making headlines today:Bank of America Corp. (BAC) is set to appoint an "emergency" CEO in case legal troubles force the controversial Kenneth Lewis to step down early. Both the SEC and New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo are threatening legal action over the bank's failure to bonuses paid to executives at Merrill Lynch before its merger with Bank of America closed. CNBC said the appointment could come before the end of the month, and that the contingency plan was in development even before Lewis announced his retirement effective December 31.
Goldman Sachs Groups Inc. (GS) may earn as much as $1 billion if CIT Group Inc. (CIT) files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and ends a $3 billion financing agreement. Shares of CIT have plummeted more than 80 percent over the past year as investors have worried about the company's viability.
Stocks in the news: CIT Group, Apple, Accenture, First Solar
Melly Alazraki
Oct 2nd 2009 at 9:00AM
Filed under: Company News, Investing, CIT Group, First Solar, General Electric , Intel, Apple, Wal-Mart Stores, Costco Wholesale Corp., Comcast
CIT Group (CIT) is seeking to cut at least $5.7 billion of debt to help it avoid collapse and return to profitability after nine quarters of losses. CIT asked bondholders to exchange unsecured obligations for new secured debt maturing in four to eight years and preferred shares. Shares jumped over 12 percent at last pre-market trade (8:47 a.m.).
Apple Inc. (AAPL) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral by UBS on bright iPhone prospects. UBS upped its Apple target to $265 from $170.
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