Citigroup to Consolidate Seven SIVs on Balance Sheet

UPDATE--Here's a roundup of stories from the WSJ, NYT and FT.
UPDATE II: MarketBeat has the last word on The Entity.

From Bloomberg:

Citigroup Inc. will bail out its seven structured investment vehicles, bringing $49 billion of assets onto its balance sheet in the biggest move yet by a bank to rescue the failing funds.

Citigroup, the largest manager of SIVs, followed HSBC Holdings Plc and WestLB AG in saving the funds and averting forced asset sales. The New York-based bank said it made the decision after Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's indicated they may cut the credit ratings of the SIVs. Moody's lowered Citigroup's long-term rating after the announcement to Aa3 from Aa2.

Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit announced the decision after being named to the post Dec. 11. Moody's said Dec. 3 that it is preparing to cut ratings on $105 billion of SIV debt, including commercial paper and medium term notes of six managed by Citigroup. The SIVs owned by Citigroup have $58 billion in senior debt and $13 billion in cash.

``It's good to see that they're doing the right thing,'' said Christopher Whalen of Hawthorne, California-based Institutional Risk Analytics, a research firm. ``HSBC set the example.''>>>Much More