IN BRIEF
NEW YORK — Citigroup customers across Central America and parts of Eastern Europe will be looking for a new place to bank next year.
Citigroup said Tuesday that it will bow out of the retail banking business in 11 markets, part of its ongoing effort since the financial crisis to restructure and slim down. The news came as the bank announced third-quarter earnings.
Citi said the impact would primarily be smaller countries in Latin America: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and Peru. It will also exit consumer banking in Egypt, Japan, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Guam.
The bank is exiting those areas to focus on market share and growth potential in places where it believes it can be competitive, Citigroup CEO Michael Corbat said in a statement.
WILMINGTON, Del. — A lawyer for billionaire Carl Icahn bluntly told a bankruptcy court judge Tuesday that Atlantic City's Trump Taj Mahal Casino resort will have to close if the judge doesn't cancel its union contract.Alan Brilliant told U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Kevin Gross that Trump Entertainment Resorts needs the financial relief that breaking the union contract would provide. As the judge appeared to be making up his mind whether to rule on the question, Brilliant said if the decision went against Trump Entertainment, the business could not survive.The company has threatened to close the casino by Nov. 13 if it can't shed pension and health care obligations to the 3,000 workers.
SALT LAKE CITY — Poison control workers say that as the e-cigarette industry has boomed, the number of children exposed to the liquid nicotine that gives hand-held vaporizing gadgets their kick also has spiked.More than 2,700 people have called poison control this year to report an exposure to liquid nicotine, over half of those cases in children younger than 6, according to national statistics. The number shows a sharp rise from only a few hundred total cases just three years ago.The drug comes in brightly colored refill packages and an array of candy flavors that can make it attractive to young children, heightening the exposure risk and highlighting the need for users to keep it away from youngsters.
NEW YORK — Olive Garden's parent company Darden Restaurants promoted Chief Operating Officer Gene Lee to interim CEO after a board takeover by an activist investor last week.The company, based in Orlando, Florida, said Tuesday that Lee will replace Clarence Otis effective immediately.The change at the top comes after Starboard Value succeeded in its bid to replace all 12 of Darden's board members with its own nominees at the company's annual meeting Friday. Under pressure from investors, Darden had announced this summer that Otis would step down by the end of this year or when a replacement was found.