Dear AIG, I quit!

Jake DeSantis, an executive VP at AIG, is quitting.

AIG executive Jake DeSantis' resignation letter to Chief Executive Edward Liddy, the boss he has never met, was published in The New York Times on Wednesday, and has created a firestorm across the Internet.

In just a shade under 1,500 words, DeSantis defends his $742,006.40 (after taxes) bonus, which he now plans to donate; berates Liddy for committing a "breach of trust" in allegedly asking for bonuses to be returned; and calls out Attorney Generals Andrew Cuomo and Richard Blumenthal as bullies for threatening to "name and shame" bonus recipients.

DeSantis, an executive vice president of AIG’s financial products unit, writes:

"I was in no way involved in — or responsible for — the credit default swap transactions that have hamstrung A.I.G. Nor were more than a handful of the 400 current employees of A.I.G.-F.P. Most of those responsible have left the company and have conspicuously escaped the public outrage. After 12 months of hard work dismantling the company — during which A.I.G. reassured us many times we would be rewarded in March 2009 — we in the financial products unit have been betrayed by A.I.G. and are being unfairly persecuted by elected officials."

The angered employee, who was "raised by schoolteachers working multiple jobs in a world of closing steel mills" and has worked for AIG for 11 years, shames Liddy:

"My guess is that in October, when you learned of these retention contracts, you realized that the employees of the financial products unit needed some incentive to stay and that the contracts, being both ethical and useful, should be left to stand. That’s probably why A.I.G. management assured us on three occasions during that month that the company would 'live up to its commitment' to honor the contract guarantees. That may be why you decided to accelerate by three months more than a quarter of the amounts due under the contracts. That action signified to us your support, and was hardly something that one would do if he truly found the contracts 'distasteful.'"

And in a final quip to the attorney general of Connecticut:

"I'm not sure how you will greet my resignation, but at least Attorney General Blumenthal should be relieved that I'll leave under my own power and will not need to be 'shoved out the door.'"

In usual blogger fashion, opinions on the letter ranged from supportive:

"They are heroes. They are victims of a rich hunt."

"The letter by AIG executive Jake DeSantis submitting his resignation should be a cause of shame for the politicians and pundits hounding AIG in connection with its payment of retention bonuses. It eloquently articulates the disgust appropriate to the occasion. Thanks to the New York Times for publishing."

…to seething:

"After this ludicrous attempt at jabbing the American taxpayer — we think that Jake probably won't have to worry about spending 10 hours away from home — no company will touch him after this."

"Are we better off because a skilled trader has left, and his book will now be wound down by someone who doesn't know it, or the markets, as well?"

America’s outrage over the exorbitant bonuses has thrust AIG into the spotlight, and has turned the struggling behemoth into the poster child for greed and mismanagement. This is one of the first defenses of the company we’ve heard — are there more to come?

-Allison Louie-Garcia

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