Citigroup Is Pausing Share Repurchases. What Now?

Citigroup (NYSE: C) CFO Mark Mason recently spoke at the Goldman Sachs Financial Services Conference and mentioned at the very end of his Q&A that the bank would be pausing share repurchases in the fourth quarter. That buried comment caught plenty of shareholders off guard, including me.

Part of the thesis for owning Citigroup right now is that the bank can repurchase a lot of shares while the stock is trading below tangible book value (TBV), which is what a bank would be worth if it were liquidated. When a bank repurchases shares below TBV, the math works out so that TBV grows and bank stocks typically trade relative to their TBV, so a growing TBV is very good for the stock long term.

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Source Fool.com