Back in 1999, I traveled to Moscow with a group of powerful business people and government officials. The most powerful of them all was Sandy Weill, CEO of Citi at the time.

Sandy was a man of action. It was almost inevitable that he would hate Moscow. The lines … the waiting … dealing with the slow-moving Russian bureaucrats…

When Sandy wasn’t squirming, he was scowling…

That is, until talk turned to his proudest accomplishment – Citigroup.

He grew it into a global financial powerhouse. And he talked confidently of leaving the world a lasting legacy.

Nobody could foresee at the time that Citigroup would instead turn into one of the world’s biggest busts.

Last week, the government took up to a 36 percent position in Citi. It was either that or letting the banking behemoth fail.

The economy is on a rampage. If tight credit, falling asset values, and weakening demand can bring down big powerful banks, think what it can do to smaller and weaker companies.

The government can’t save everybody. Bankruptcies spiked by 14 percent last year. That was just a taste of what’s going to happen this year. I expect the bankruptcy rate to double.

Source: The Bankruptcy of USA Inc.