1 Big Disappointment From Citigroup's Q3 Earnings Report

Citigroup's (NYSE: C) third-quarter earnings results were fine, with the bank generating $2.15 in earnings per share on revenue of about $17.2 billion, both numbers that beat analysts' projections. However, those numbers failed to really excite investors who are still waiting for Citigroup to execute its new strategy under Chief Executive Officer Jane Fraser. One thing I was particularly disappointed in was the number of shares Citigroup repurchased in the quarter. Here's why.

In the third quarter, Citigroup returned $4 billion of capital to shareholders, $3 billion of which was in the form of share repurchases. That was disappointing to me because the bank bought back $3 billion of stock in the second quarter at a time when the Federal Reserve had placed limits on large bank capital distributions. Those restrictions were no longer in place during the third quarter and Citigroup has plenty of capital, so it was unclear to me why the bank didn't increase its share repurchases.

Image source: Citigroup.

Source Fool.com