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Citigroup - Source: Reuters -
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Beleaguered Citigroup said it was profitable in the first two months of the year and stock markets leaped at the rare good news.
Citigroup Chief Executive Vikram Pandit, whose company's share price fell below $US1 last week, told his staff the company was having its best quarter-to-date performance since the third quarter of 2007, when it earned $US2.2 billion.
It has since lost $US37.5 billion and received a US government bailout.
"I am most encouraged with the strength of our business so far
in 2009," Pandit wrote in a staff memo, and investors were
too.
Led by Citigroup, stocks on Wall Street surged. The Dow Jones
Industrial average jumped more than 3% and the Nasdaq composite was
up 4.6%. The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index rose 3.6%.
In Tokyo, where the stock market closed before news of the Citigroup memo, shares fell 0.4% to a 26-year closing low.
