The Treasury Department has sold a second tranche of Citigroup Inc. common stock, bringing the government's profits from sales of the bank's shares above $2 billion and reducing its ownership stake in the company to around 18%.
The Treasury's latest sale of 1.1 billion shares brings the total number of shares sold by the agency to 2.6 billion, about one-third of the government's holdings.
The federal government sold its Citi shares for an average of $4.03 each after paying $3.25 a share to acquire the stock as part of a deal to provide Citigroup with billions in aid.
But the government's returns on its second sale, from May 27 to June 30, were slightly lower than in its first offering, from April 26 to May 26. Those shares fetched $4.13 each while the second sale fetched around $3.89 a share.
The Treasury still holds 5.1 billion Citigroup shares and plans to continue selling them "in an orderly fashion" once a blackout related to Citi's second-quarter earnings release ends. Citigroup shares finished Thursday at $3.78, up two cents.
"We are pleased that Treasury has profitably sold a third of its common shares in Citi," a company spokesman said.
