Um, what? This is yet another bonus though they're now giving it another name. Maybe this is capitalism to Rick Santelli and CNBC but for everyone else who works for a living to fund their plush lifestyle, it's socialism for the elite. Citi and Morgan Stanley are receiving $55 BILLION in TARP money so let them decide to either keep that money and make do without new bonuses or hand out billions of their own money, wherever that may come from and run the risk of total failure. Whether they want to gamble - as they've done for a while - and use their own money and risk failure is fine by me, but don't come begging for more in the future.
Since the Wall Street worshipers love talking so much about socialism, fine, let's talk about it. Let Rick Santelli walk Main Street and see how his silly rants fly with Americans who aren't traders and banksters. Let's do a live feed and see how it all works out when he talks about the path to communism. Then let him explain how taxpayer bailouts of banks isn't socialism. The banksters, Santelli and CNBC can all go Cheney themselves.
Morgan Stanley'sbrokerage joint venture with Citigroup Inc will pay brokers as much as $3 billion to stay on, while Wells Fargo & Co will not offer retention payouts to brokers from the former Wachovia Corp.
Retention bonuses are often paid to keep brokers from defecting after a company is bought. Financial companies, however, are facing strong criticism from Congress and regulators to limit pay in the wake of heavy credit-related losses and large taxpayer-funded infusions into the sector.
Brokers at Morgan Stanley and Citigroup's Smith Barney unit who produce at least $1.75 million of revenue may be eligible for a payment equal to 105 percent of their annual production, according to a person familiar with the plan.
About 6,500 of the combined entity's 20,000 brokers are expected to be eligible for the retention package, with the first payment in January 2010 and the second in 2012, the person said. Overall retention bonuses could total $2 billion to $3 billion, the person said.
Citigroup and Morgan Stanley together received $55 billion of capital infusions from the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program.
