The Ethics of Citibank Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

The Ethics of Citibank - Research Paper Example As a means of understanding the ethical ramifications of the collapse and the contributing factors that ultimately led up to it, the analysis will first delve into something of a historical analysis of the collapse so that the key decisions that Citibank made leading up to and just prior to the collapse can be understood within a broader appreciation for the means by which successive ethical oversights and dependency behavior created the perfect something of a perfect storm that has affected untold millions around the world and cost untold trillions in loss to the global economy. Moreover, it is the hope of this author that such an analysis will help the reader to not only come to an appreciation for ethical factors and the impacts that they can have but to create a sense of urgency within the mind of the reader to integrate with ethical decision making at each and every step of the business process. As such, the forthcoming analysis will break down the financial collapse and subsequ ent ethical oversights into two main sectors; those dealing with the ethical oversights that existed prior to the crash and contributed to the global financial meltdown (evidenced within Citibank), and those ethical oversights that took place after the crash and fundamentally concerned appropriation and disbursal of stimulus funding. Taking the more recent situation first, it can be noted that in excess of 220 billion USD was allocated to Citibank by the Federal government as a result of TARP. The initial reason for this allocation was of course the fact that the Federal government and key decision makers within the Federal Reserve felt that without TARP stimulus it would be highly possible that the poor investment structure of Citibank could lead to its collapse. Due to the fact that Citibank and others were labeled as â€Å"too big to fail†, it was determined that it was vitally necessary to transfer this massive amount of money from the taxpayers into the coffers of some of the largest financial institutions in the world. Not surprisingly, Citibank and others were none to alarmed with such a rapid increase in the overall level of money that they could leverage to meet their liabilities. Unfortunately, rather than leveraging this money and immediately doing a thorough audit of their firm to ensure that k ey standards were being met and no such situation as had been witnessed the following year could ever occur again, the key ethical oversight of merely continuing to conduct business as usual was witnessed. Certainly, it can be noted that Citibank and others met minimum federal requirements; however, a proactive stance in seeking to maximize their shareholders utility and minimize any potential and lingering levels of ethical oversights was not engaged. Moreover, it can also be noted that one of the first major managerial decisions that was made after the financial collapse and subsequent federal disbursal of bailout funds was with relation to liberal bonuses for many of the top leadership positions within Citibank. This serves as perhaps the most visible ethical oversight that this brief analysis will analyze. The news media soon picked up on this revelation and broadcast the names and actual bonus levels that many of these upper