AIG was legally obligated to consider joining the lawsuit being brought against the government by former AIG Chief Executive Maurice Greenberg, who claims that the terms of the $182 billion bailout weren't fair to AIG shareholders.

The prospect of AIG joining the lawsuit had already triggered outrage. A congressman from Vermont issued a statement telling AIG: "Don't even think about it."

AIG was rescued from the brink of collapse by the U.S. government at the height of the 2008 financial crisis. The insurance company nearly imploded after making huge bets on mortgage investments that later went wrong.

The company currently has an ad campaign themed "Thank You America."

Continue Reading...

Pandit is often lumped in with the Wall Street CEOs who were responsible for the great financial crisis, but that's not quite accurate. His initial appointment as CEO came in December 2007, a month after his predecessor, Chuck Prince, was ousted for financial losses associated with subprime mortgages gone bad. Pandit had no previous background in commercial banking -- he was a hedge fund trader who'd cashed in by selling his fund to Citigroup. He wasn't one of the Citi execs busily structuring synthetic collateralized debt obligations out of dodgy mortgages and then pawning them off to unwary clients. His job was to clean up the mess.

Continue Reading...