Citigroup's Corporate Special Opportunities hedge fund is returning only three cents on the dollar to investors — underscoring the depths of the difficulties at the alternative investment unit once headed by the bank's current chief executive, Vikram Pandit.

The amount being returned is less than had been expected when the company decided to wind up the fund last year, and came as bruising news for investors who had been prevented from withdrawing their money since January 2008.

Citi also stands to lose hundreds of millions of dollars it lent to CSO. It provided the fund with as much as $450 million (£303 million) in credit lines and $320 million in equity, while also placing assets with a nominal value of $1 billion that it had bought in the fund. Without Citi's support, the hedge fund, which invested in corporate debt, would have had negative equity, says City Spy's Citi nark...

* SIR John Gieve, the outgoing Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, says: “There is no doubt that an appreciable fall in the pound, such as we have seen, has been helpful in supporting exports.” Really, Sir John? With the trade gap at its widest since 1697 and exports down 6%, City Spy is not so sure.

* CHEER up everyone. “Bailouts are good news,” says the BBC's business editor Robert Peston on Radio 4.

It's the joy of going bust

Hedgie Hugh Hendry, the self-styled “Frankenstein lovechild of Crispin Odey”, has launched a passionate defence of his hero, the Austrian economist and ladies' man Joseph Schumpeter, who coined the phrase “creative destruction” to describe capitalism.

Hendry, founder of Eclectica Asset Management after he left Odey's side, also had harsh words for today's credit-crunch bankers, comparing their easy ride with what Schumpeter did when the bank he led went bust —he went off to teach at Harvard, and spent 11 years paying off his debts. “An example which I think should be followed by today's bankers who got us into our present mess,” says Hendry.

White van man is driven mad

WHITE van man is in mourning. The Commercial Vehicle Show, the equivalent of the Motor Show but for van drivers, has been cancelled. It was due to happen at the end of April at Birmingham's NEC but is now another victim of the credit crunch. Which makes you wonder about the Motor Show which only last year returned to London, taking up new residence at the ExCeL centre in Docklands. Luckily, the show is biennial. The next show is scheduled for July 2010. Hopefully, someone somewhere may have bought a new car by then and some manufacturer somewhere may have committed to building a new model.

* WHO is the chief of a listed contractor mentioned in Building magazine who got into a fist-fight with one of his clients?

Kate will keep 'em guessing

SIR Philip Green's Bhs has launched a credit-crunch-busting wedding dress. For just £100, brides can get a complete outfit, including shoes, for their big day.

Question is, amid all the talk of wedding bells for Green's friend and designer of her own range for his Topshop chain, supermodel Kate Moss and her boyfriend Jamie Hince of The Kills, could she be persuaded to don the dress when she walks down the aisle? City Spy isn't holding its breath.

* GERMAN coffee giant Tchibo and the Esso garage chain have pulled an advertising campaign using a slogan that, er, once greeted inmates at the gates of Buchenwald. “Jedem den Seinen” translates as everyone gets what he deserves: for the victims of Buchenwald, it usually meant being worked, starved, beaten and killed. An estimated 57,000 prisoners died there. Tchibo twinned with Esso to advertise its coffee machines in 700 German petrol stations with the slogan. Following a huge outcry from Jewish groups and Holocaust scholars, the ad campaign has been junked and profuse apologies offered. Tchibo spokeswoman Angelika Scholz said no offence was intended and the slogan was “unfortunately selected”.

Redundancy advice is not cheap

AREN'T redundancies supposed to save firms money? One group of credit crunch cashers-in is advertising a course on “handling redundancies”.
The blurb promises to “give you all the information and confidence you need from knowing your legal obligations, the processes you will need to follow, how to deal with difficult situations, and how to manage those that are left behind”. The cost? A mere £299 plus VAT. With lunch and refreshments included. Obviously.

* ASKED about his favourite Olympian, Sainsbury's chief executive Justin King nominated Dick Emery (the late comedian), whose catchphrase was “ooh, you are awful”) . He quickly corrected that to David Hemery, Olympic 400m champion at the 1968 Mexico City Games. Best to get such a slip out of the way before King makes his debut in April at the board of the London Olympic organising committee, Locog.

* THERE'S one place you can still get 8% interest on your cash. It's the Court Funds Office. So all you need to do is get a libel/defamation threat from someone, decide to pay money into court in anticipation you lose, but then you win and collect 8%. Genius!

* BP is understood to have outsourced significant amounts of its IT development to Satyam, the Indian computer systems company...

* COBBLERS. The service provided by shoe-repair and key-cutting booths gives the most customer satisfaction to British consumers. Eh? So says the Institute of Customer Service, whose annual survey found the nation's cobblers just pipped the nation's hairdressers. Going anywhere nice this year?

* KEEP taking the pills. “Like procyclicality on speed,” says risk consultant Brandon Davies in The Economist of the new bank accounting rules. “Like a kangaroo on acid” — Taylor Wimpey boss Pete Redfern in an email to staff on the company's fluctuating share price.