Hartford warrants sell for $700 million
Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. stock warrants sold for $13.70 each at a U.S. Treasury Department auction on Tuesday, raising about $700 million for taxpayers, Bloomberg reported. The Treasury demanded warrants from recipients of bailout money from its Troubled Asset Relief Program as compensation for the risks it was taking with taxpayer dollars. The warrants entitled holders to purchase Hartford stock at $9.79 a share, compared with yesterday’s closing price of $23.16. The Treasury Department had raised more than $7 billion as of Sept. 10 by selling warrants back to the companies or through public auctions. The biggest divestiture was for Bank of America Corp., the largest U.S. lender by assets, whose bailout warrants sold at auction in March for more than $1.5 billion.