May 2008

  Given the conference call was with the press, it was brief, only lasting around twenty minutes. One reporter wanted to know how the deal came to be, but EDS's CEO was mum on the behind the scenes saga. He says the companies have been in talks "for sometime" but said investors and reporters will have to wait for the proxy to get all the nitty gritty details. The proxy will be out in a couple of ... read more

  With any merger there's always concerns about overlap and thus layoffs. EDS CEO Ronald Rittenmeyer says H-P's services business and EDS have "little" overlap. As for layoffs, Rittenmeyer says the company, before the deal, had been in the process of "streamlining" the business. "Obviously there's going to be some changes," says Rittenmeyer. ... read more

H-P's  (HPQ) CEO Mark Hurd says on the call the acquisition of EDS (EDS) meets the company's goal of expanding its services businesses. According to Hurd, who largely reiterated comments in the company's press release, says with EDS, H-P will double its services business. H-P's services business which had revenue of more than $38 billion, already has 210,000 employees. The deal, says Hurd is ... read more

In its biggest deal since acquiring Compaq, Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) announced it's buying Electronic Data Systems (EDS) for $13.9 billion, marking a more than 30% premium from EDS' stock closing price Monday. Reports have been swirling that H-P was close to inking a deal for EDS. The move is designed to bolster H-P's computer services business, making it second only to IBM, the powerhouse of IT ... read more

  Alas the Citi analyst meeting is over after more than three hours.  Not too many shockers coming from the meeting given the intense attention Citi garners from the press. Analysts largely went easy on the Citi executives including Pandit. The same couldn't be said for Citi's investor meeting last month. Check out Elizabeth MacDonald's blog posting for that story. read more

  Executives at Citi faced questions about its move to raise capital by selling shares. Citi defended the practice by saying that having excess capital is a sign of strength in times of uncertainty. Citigroup says there are a number opportunities that the company can use the excess capital for.  Since November Citi has raised $40 billion and recently announced it widening a new stock offering ... read more

Right out of the gate analysts want to know why Citi isn't divesting more assets and why Pandit seems to be embracing the old business mix under ousted CEO Chuck Prince. One analyst asked Pandit why Citi doesn't get rid of its U.S. consumer business, a business analysts have said make sense to shed. Pandit says Citi won't do that because he thinks the U.S. consumer unit is a "great business." ... read more

  On asset sales, Crittenden said most of the legacy assets that will be sold or taken off the books are in the securities and banking and consumer banking units. Citi is aiming to have the securities and banking legacy assets off the company's books in two to three years with 50% of the consumer banking legacy assets gone in that time frame. As for revenue, the CFO said the company is targeting ... read more

What will make Citi's stock actually increase is the 800 pound gorilla in the room. Citi's stock is down 53.7% since 2001. Citi CFO Gary Crittenden is trying to answer that as the presentation portion of the meeting starts to wrap up. (Most companies save the CFO for last to keep analysts and investors at the meeting and interested.) Crittenden says Citi is targeting a 75% efficiency ratio in ... read more

With the credit market crisis creating A LOT of turmoil in the financial services industry, Pandit took time to discuss risk with analysts and investors. According to Pandit the financial market is shifting away from just-in-time liquidity and capital, which means the future model for Citi and other financial services companies will be to have more capital and larger balance sheets beyond what ... read more