‘Finders keepers,’ hedge funds say

Citigroup is blaming human error after wiring $900 million to lenders to the cosmetics company, Revlon, said Elisa Martinuzzi in Bloomberg.com.

The lenders had been at odds with Revlon and Citi, claiming that Revlon had been “pillaging” the collateral on its loans and was in default. Last week, Citi, which had planned to pay the lenders’ group the interest on the disputed loans, instead paid the entire principal in what Citi calls a “simple human lapse.” Unfortunately, the lenders, led by the hedge fund Brigade Capital— which received

$176 million—refuse to return the money, saying they have simply been paid money they are owed. Now this “embarrassing cockup” is playing out in court. “In the who’s who of payment errors, Citi isn’t the worst.” Deutsche Bank erroneously wired $25 billion in a derivatives trade in 2014, and then again made a $33 billion payment mistake in 2018.