A single misplaced decimal point can ruin anyone’s day. But when you’re Citigroup, a few extra zeros can create an $81 trillion nightmare. That’s trillion with a “T.” In April 2024, a Citigroup employee made what might be the most expensive typo in banking history when processing a routine $280 payment to a Brazilian customer.
In the world of Citigroup, a forgotten decimal point doesn’t just ruin your day—it threatens the global economy.
Here’s what happened: the amount field was pre-filled with 15 zeros. The employee simply forgot to delete the extras. Oops. Two other employees initially missed it too. Thank goodness someone was paying attention—a third employee caught the mistake 90 minutes later. Crisis averted.
The bank reversed the transaction within hours. No harm done, right? Well, except for the collective heart attacks at Citigroup headquarters when they realized they’d accidentally credited someone with more money than the entire U.S. economy produces in four years.
This wasn’t Citigroup’s first rodeo with massive mistakes. In 2020, they accidentally wired $900 million to Revlon creditors. Last year alone, they reported 10 “near misses” involving billion-dollar-plus transactions. Their technological infrastructure is clearly held together with duct tape and prayers.
Regulators aren’t amused. The Federal Reserve and Office of the Comptroller of Currency were notified about this latest fiasco. Citigroup already paid a $400 million fine in 2020 for risk management failures and another $136 million in 2023 for insufficient progress fixing those problems. The bank is now investing in compliance and technology to enhance data governance and improve regulatory reporting.
CEO Jane Fraser must be thrilled with this development. Nothing says “competent leadership” like your bank accidentally creating enough money to buy Amazon 40 times over.
Citigroup’s spokesperson confirmed the transaction was not executed and emphasized no actual funds left the bank. The error was attributed to a combination of outdated backup system and human error. Their “detective controls” worked! Eventually! After the mistake was already made!
The incident highlights a scary truth about modern banking: sometimes trillion-dollar mistakes come down to one person remembering to delete a few zeros. Sleep tight, everyone.
