Coverage of Citigroup leaves readers unsure what's going on

Hal Morris, writing on his Grumpy Editor blog, wonders whether editors writing the headlines for the stories about the Wednesday announcement by Citigroup that it’s restructuring really understand what they’re writing headlines about.

Morris wrote, “The headline in yesterday’s The Wall Street Journal: ‘Citigroup Starts Handing Out Pink Slips in Its Restructuring.’ Then the headline on an Associated Press story yesterday: ‘Citigroup to Cut 17,000 Jobs.’

“But hold on.

“Grumpy Editor noted the AP piece has Citi executives saying the elimination of the jobs won’t reduce the bank’s work force (globally, 327,000 employees) but merely slow its growth. Then it added that Robert Druskin, Citi’s chief operating officer, in a conference call with Wall Street analysts said they should expect Citi’s headcount to grow this year because of acquisitions and plans to open new branches, especially overseas.

“The WSJ version said Citigroup’s cost-cutting plan is expected to include net reductions of about 15,000 jobs through layoffs and attrition and an additional 10,000 or more U.S. positions may be lost in a move to cheaper overseas locations such as India. AP came up with about the same numbers, indicating in its lead that Citigroup will eliminate about 17,000 jobs and shift 9,500 positions to ‘lower cost locations.'”

Read more here.