Is Citigroup The Worst Stock Ever?

Normally at Benzinga we don't spend too much time bashing stocks and management, but in the case of Citigroup

, we would be remiss if we didn't mention that this may be one of the worst stocks of all time. The bag holders who bought the government's shares in Citi are getting raked over the coals as C has shed 15% this month alone. The sad part of the Citigroup saga is that their "Too Big To Fail" status prevented this bank from being put to rest, as it should have been in a real capitalist system - but most of us know that capitalism in America has been dead for a long time. Citi's recent 10 for 1 stock split was nothing if not comical. The bank, whose stock is down 92% in the last 5 years, reverted to a tactic that is most commonly seen in the micro-cap space. Making matters worse, is that the stock has been plunging since this split, which was likely designed to circumvent the mandate that some large institutional investors have against investing in stocks under $5. When Citi did the 10 for 1 split, the shares were trading at $45 - just a short time later they are trading at $38.36 after plunging almost 4% on Monday. The only other bank that is nearly as pathetic as the moribund, taxpayer funded Citigroup is Bank of America

, which has lost 30% over the last 52-weeks and 78% over the last 5 years. What is really amazing is that Vikram Pandit at Citi and Brian Moynihan at Bank of America, still have their jobs. These CEOs have been telling shareholders every quarter for the better part of two years that things are on the cusp of turning around, yet judging by the banks' depressed stock prices, this is more fantasy than reality. Knife catchers beware, these bank stocks may not yet be done slicing up investors' portfolios.