Prince gets millions on his way out

Charles Prince is leaving Citigroup Inc. at the end of the year with approximately $95 million in stock, a bonus and other benefits, but the amount could fall if the embattled company’s shares tumble even further.

Citigroup said in a regulatory filing late Thursday that it is giving Prince, who announced his retirement as CEO late Sunday, $29.5 million in stock awards, options and pension.

In addition to that sum, Prince is entitled to an end-of-the-year incentive bonus based on the stock’s performance at the end of 2007. Currently, that bonus is valued at about $12 million. Citigroup’s stock has sunk 41 percent so far this year, and shares fell 51 cents to close Thursday at $32.90.

Prince also owns 1.61 million Citigroup shares currently worth around $53 million.

Meanwhile, he will receive salary until the end of the year, and is entitled to an office, an administrative assistant, and a car and driver for five years or until he finds other employment, Citigroup said in Thursday’s filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Prince, whose 2006 compensation was about $25 million, is leaving the nation’s largest bank with billions of dollars of risky debt on its books.

•Brazil’s state oil company said Thursday that it has discovered as much as 8 billion barrels of light crude in an ultra-deep field off the coast of Rio de Janeiro, an amount that could help transform the country into a major world oil exporter.

Petroleo Brasileiro SA’s announcement that the Tupi field has between 5 billion and 8 billion barrels of recoverable light oil sent Petrobras shares soaring 26 percent in New York, to a close at a new 52-week high.

The sheer magnitude of the find suggests Brazil could transform itself from a medium-level oil producer “to another level, like Venezuela, Arab nations and others,” said presidential chief of staff Dilma Rousseff.

“This has changed our reality,” she said, adding that the amount in the Tupi field could represent 40 percent of all oil ever discovered in Brazil.

•Radio station and billboard advertising leader Clear Channel Communications Inc. said Thursday third-quarter earnings surged 51 percent, as outdoor advertising revenue continued to grow sharply.

Net income for the July-September period climbed to $279.7 million, or 56 cents per share, from $185.9 million, or 38 cents per share, in the same period last year.

Analysts had expected profits of only 38 cents per share, on average.

From wire reports