All 1,066 employees of the bankrupt trading house MF Global got the boot yesterday in a pre-holiday massacre that left workers without severance and benefits -- and they blamed only one man for their woes."Happy holidays, Corzine, from all your employees who've been fired without severance packages!" a worker fumed at her former company CEO as she left the firm's building at 717 Fifth Ave.
"I have two little kids, it's almost Christmas, the economy stinks -- how am I gonna find a job?" said another worker who just cleaned out his desk.
The 1,066 employees will be paid through next Tuesday, and health benefits will run out at the end of November. Bonuses and other financial perks won't be paid, workers said.
"It ended like this because of one man," said Anthony DiMatteo, who worked for MF for 16 years. Corzine is "selfish, greedy," he said.
If Corzine were around, DiMatteo told Bloomberg News, "I would punch him in the face."
Another expressed his fury by donning a T-shirt that read: "F--k you, you f--kin' f--k!"
| Any of you folks bother to challenge him before he ran the company into the ground? Anyone go to the board of directors? No? Sorry, no sympathy from me. |
The former New Jersey governor and Goldman Sachs chief took the helm at the venerable trading firm in 2010. He resigned last week, saying he would not seek about $12 million in severance.
Yesterday, his furious former troops blamed the onetime financial rainmaker for playing fast and loose with their livelihoods.
"Corzine went to the blackjack table and took a 100 percent bet," said Pierre Yvan Desparois, a credit department vice president who worked at MF Global for 3 1/2 years. "He placed bets with people's lives."
"Anybody coming out of grad school could have told him not to make those bets," said Desparois.
And, though he figured the layoffs were coming, Desparois said he wonders, "How long can I survive?"
"Corzine screwed up really well, and put a lot of people in uncomfortable positions. The lives of so many people have been disrupted."
The firings did not apply to MF's parent company, which has about 2,800 employees.
Bankruptcy trustee James Giddens is still trying to find about $600 million in missing customer money. Forensic probers are trying to account for the brokerage firm's assets, and federal agencies are investigating whether MF mixed company funds with money missing from customer accounts. Giddens said about 150 to 200 MF brokerage employees will be hired back to assist in the "wind-down" of the business.
Corzine could not be reached for comment.